A path Rewritten
by Alexis96
Summary: Fem/Naru Naruko is only wanting to become the greatest Hokage there ever was but she has a long way to go, between fighting dangerous enemies, making new friends, and falling in love. She's going to have to become strong to survive what life is throwing her way but with her precious people behind her she'll prevail, and her dream will become reality.
1. Introducing Uzumaki Naruko

**A Path Rewritten**

 **Chapter One**

 **Introducing Uzumaki Naruko!**

 **Hey guys so I hope you like this. It will be a FEM/Naruto/Sasuke pairing. This story will follow very closely to cannon as I will be pulling out text from Naruto. I will also be adding in my own scenes so that you can see how Sasuke and Naruko get together. Also I promise not everything will be word for word, there will be times when I change up the original text and add my own in.**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto only the things that you don't recognize.**

A small blonde child laid unceremoniously at the feet of a black clad figure, his face hidden behind the mask of a lion. Though his expression couldn't be seen the annoyance and anger rolled off of him in waves as he glared down at the pigtailed little girl, who was staring up at him with wide, watery, cerulean blue eyes. The whisker like marks that lined her cheeks seemed to twitch as she tried to keep from crying.

"Lord Hokage, I found this one outside decimating the Hokage mountain," The ANBU member hissed as his eyes narrowed behind the mask. Naruko stared up at the intimidating figure as her face began to turn red. She felt like that was exaggerating a little bit as she was only using paint, but felt too terrified to say anything out in her defense. The man held no fondness toward her, much like the rest of the village, though she had no idea why that was. They all seemed to send her the same cold, cruel look that caused her to shiver with loneliness.

The Sandaime Hokage stared down at the small girl with what was akin to affection. The old man was the only one she ever found comfort in, he never stared at her with cruelty, or dislike, but instead with grandfatherly endearment.

"I'm sorry, jii-san," Naruko sniffled as she wiped at her face trying to rid herself of the few tears that had fallen. The Hokage smiled down at her as she called him her grandfather, she had been calling him that since she was three years old. It was hard for him to think that it was only three years ago. She had become more of a handful as she grew older, but knew she never truly meant anything bad by her pranks. It was clearly just a way for her to be recognized and it still pained him to this day that he couldn't take her in, but between Hokage duties, and his own grandson he just wouldn't have the time.

"You are dismissed," the Hokage said waving his hand as the ANBU member disappeared from the room, but not before he glared one last time at the demon child. "Naru, what have I told you about your pranks? Not everyone finds them as amusing as you do."

"I didn't mean anything by it," she stuttered out but became more at ease as soon as the cold man had left. Picking herself from the floor she wiped the dirt that was smudged on her orange shorts.

The Hokage stared down at the girl still finding it incredible that she had picked the bright orange outfit. Her shorts were bright orange with a dark blue apron skirt, while her kimono shirt was the same bright orange, the sleeves only going down to her elbows, with dark blue designs on it. It was practical to fight in, as she was training to become a ninja, but the color would easily be spotted. There would be no hiding from her enemies no matter where she was, but it fit her boisterous attitude.

Picking himself up from his seat he walked around the desk to stand in front of Naruko. His hand coming out to lay on her shoulder as he smiled down at her, trying to put her at ease. "I know, I'm not angry young one. You will have to clean it up as I'm sure you already know, it will be your punishment."

The tears disappeared from her eyes as she glanced up at her jii-san. He ruffled her blonde bangs sending her yet another warm smile that eased the hole in her chest that could only be filled by love. "Yes, sir," she said. "I'll do it right now!" The Hokage chuckled as he moved to go sit back behind his desk.

"Don't you have to get to the academy?" he asked with a raise of his eyebrow. Naruko frowned knowing she was caught in the act of skipping class. "You'll clean up the mountain afterwards."

"Okay, jii-san, I promise I'll get it done." She turned to leave her face heating up from embarrassment by being caught. Just as she stretched up onto her tiptoes to reach the doorknob his voice stopped her.

"Oh, and Naruko, I don't want to hear about you skipping class again." Naruko ducked her head as she ran out of the room and away from the Hokage tower. It wasn't something she felt that she would be able to promise her jii-san. Classes tended to bore her as they hadn't gotten to actually learning anything hands on. She understood she needed the knowledge of the basics before she could actually do it, but it was still taxing to learn it all.

Sighing she raced toward the academy knowing that she would be getting a lecture from Iruka-sensei when she arrived. Perhaps if she wasn't overly late he would go easier on her.

 **~3~**

 **Six Years Later**

Naruko stared around the classroom after having arrived on time, she remembered the unspoken promise to jii-san and had tried her best to keep it. Over the years she had only skipped a few times after their conversation, mostly with Choji, shikamaru, and Kiba. They were the only ones that would have anything to do with the girl. Surrounded by guys wasn't her first option but females her age didn't want anything to do with her at all.

They weren't interested in being her friend as she was deemed weird, and someone she should stay away from by their parents.

Sighing she placed her cheek on the palm of her hand, as the rest of the class piled in around her. Today was exam day and she was determined to pass this time, if only the bunshin wouldn't be placed on it. Naruko seemed to have difficulty no matter what she did, she just couldn't seem to expel the right amount of Chakra. Her body just felt overfull with Chakra that disrupted any flow and then caused the clones to come out dead and sickly looking.

It was embarrassing but she didn't have anyone that could tell her why that was, and what she was doing wrong. Her cerulean eyes grew dimmer at the reminder that she was all alone, her body slumped forward.

She would do her best, she would become a Kunoichi, prove herself, and become Hokage, that was her dream. Sitting up straighter she became determined, today would be the day that she passed. Believe it! Her eyes grew brighter at the thought as she held her head higher practically bouncing in her seat with the need for the exam to start already.

Finally after what seemed like hours Iruka-sensei walked into the classroom announcing with his presence that the exams were starting.

"We'll call your name one by one to come into the next room and perform for the exam," Iruka announced as he stared at each of his students. His eyes lingered on the blonde pigtailed girl in the back as he knew what he was going to say next would dampen her spirits. "To graduate you'll have to successfully use the 'Bunshin no Jutsu'."

As predicted his words caused Naruko to deflate some but it didn't stop her determination to pass. She'd have to if she wanted to become Hokage, that alone would drive her to win, people would one day acknowledge her existence.

One by one her classmates were called until finally "Uzumaki Naruko!" was called. Pulling herself to her feet Naruko could feel just the slightest bit of doubt as she walked toward the door of the other room. Swallowing hard Naruko took the last step and pushed open the door as she hesitantly took a step into the room. Once inside she glanced around but the classroom was empty besides the two Chunin and a table full of forehead protectors. Turning her attention back to Iruka-sensei and Mizuki-sensei she waited for them to tell her what to do.

"You may start," Iruka said with a nod toward the small girl. Nodding Naruko lifted her hands determination running through her veins, as she did the hand seals ram, snake, tiger.

"Bunshin no Jutsu!" she called out as she finished with the hand signs. Feeling fear once again she glanced to her side but instead of seeing a perfect clone standing beside her she saw hers laying on the floor. It looked pale, a washed out version of herself, its eyes staring ahead unseeingly, as the body was limp and unresponsive. The clone looked sick and close to death, it had been a failure.

Her body deflated as she wrapped her arms around her middle, she knew that she had failed before they even said anything.

"I'm sorry Naruko but you have failed," Iruka said as Mizuki glanced over toward his comrade.

"Iruka," Mizuki started as he glanced over at Naruko. "This is her third time taking this test, and she was able to make a clone, even if it wasn't perfect. We should just let her pass." Naruko didn't even bother getting her hopes up at this, she knew Iruka-sensei and knew he wouldn't allow her too. She just wasn't ready, who would want a ninja who couldn't even make a simple clone. Even though Mizuki would fail she was still grateful that he had even tried to pass her. It meant a lot to her that he had at least tried.

"I'm sorry Mizuki but everyone else made two clones, and Naruko only made one, that was useless. I can't let her pass, she can try again next year." Pain exploded in her chest at her sensei's words as a look of hurt crossed over her features before she forced them deep down. Naruko would never allow anyone to see her weakness.

"I understand Iruka-sensei," Naruko gasped out trying to shove out a happy and carefree persona, like she didn't care that it would be another year. Iruka seeing past the happiness and to the pain sent her a sorrowful look but he could not pass her. Turning around Naruko allowed shadows to cross over her eyes as no one could see them now.

Once she had left the room she allowed her head to dip forward as the sadness came crushing down suffocating her. She forced herself to keep moving forward, to not slow down because if she did she would collapse in on herself. Arms still wrapped tightly around herself she took another step forward, followed by another, and another until she came to the swing that hung from the tree right outside the academy. Not being able to push herself forward any further she collapsed on the swing, straddling it so she could watch as people tumbled out of the school.

All around her she could hear her fellow, or old, classmates being congratulated by their parents and family. Each word stung at her own heart, it was prove how alone she truly was. She had no parents, no family, all alone. No one was around to tell her that she would get it next year, that everything would be okay.

No, that was her own duty. Glancing up she could see Iruka staring her way but as soon as he looked away Naruko stood up from the swing and took off down the road. There was no reason for her to stay here. All there was, was torture, and she already had enough of that to last a lifetime.

 **~3~**

Naruko was walking down a deserted street, she had chosen it so that no one would mess with her. The last thing she needed was for someone to realize she hadn't passed and pick on her for it. Kicking at a rock she stared ahead, she would train, get better for next year. Even if it meant she had to train until she bled and passed out from exhaustion.

If that's what it took she would do it.

Not noticing a person had walked up behind her, she jumped when her name was called out. Spinning around she came face to face with Mizuki-sensei. Curiosity took over her expression as she took a step forward. What was he doing here? She kind of wished he would leave, she wanted to be alone. However not wanting to seem rude especially in front of the person who tried to pass her she plastered on a strained smile.

"Mizuki-sensei, what are you doing here?"

"Follow me Naruko," Mizuki said not wanting to be overheard when he talked the girl into stealing the scroll. But to do that he first had to appeal to her or she would never do it, even for teacher figure in her life. The girl wasn't stupid, she knew right between wrong, but he was hoping he could blur that line by the time he asked her to do it.

Nodding Naruko instantly did as he asked, he was someone she could trust why wouldn't she? Mizuki jumped up on the nearest building with Naruko following closely behind as they traveled higher and higher before settling on a ledge. Looking out toward where the sun would be setting soon Naruko waited for Mizuki to say what he had come to tell her.

"Iruka-sensei is a serious person Naruko, you have to understand that," Mizuki said trying to make her understand. "His parents were killed when he was young and he had to take care of everything himself." He was trying to appeal to the fact that her parents had died when she was young as well, hoping that this would play into his hands. Naruko frowned trying to understand what Mizuki was saying to her, she still felt bitter toward Iruka-sensei.

"It still doesn't make since why he only picks on me," Naruko said bitterly. Mizuki watched Naruko out of the corner of his eye. The young girl curled her hands into a fist at her side. Mizuki smirked hiding it from the girl as he thought that his plan on falling into place. Now all he had to do was appeal to her a little more before telling her about his 'special secret'.

"He probably sees himself in you, he's probably thinking he wants to see you become strong in the way he did. Try to understand Iruka's feelings since you also have no parents." Frowning Naruko bowed her head, it hurt to hear the truth.

"Still," Naruko muttered as she stared down at her fists. "I wish I had graduated." She had a dream, one that seemed harder now to succeed in. Looking away from Naruko Mizuki smirked.

"In that case, I'll tell you a special secret." This caught Naruko's attention as she pulled herself around to face the older man. Leaning forward she listened in as Mizuki told her about the special scroll and how she would need to go about getting it. Naruko frowned thinking that it was stealing from the Hokage, and she couldn't do that.

"But wouldn't that be stealing, Mizuki-sensei?" Naruko asked announcing her doubts.

"It's not stealing Naruko-chan," Mizuki said trying to ease her worrying. "It's a secret exam only for those who are special. In your case you're the special one. You won't get in trouble, all you have to do is take it from the Hokage and then go to our rendezvous place. Then when you get there you can learn as much as you want, and it'll prove to Iruka-sensei that you have what it takes to pass the exam."

Still frowning Naruko thought it over, surely if she wasn't suppose to do it Mizuki wouldn't tell her too. He was her sensei, someone to trust. He wouldn't lead her astray. Finally she nodded causing Mizuki to beam at her.

 **~3~**

Taking off Naruko ran across the rooftops toward where the Hokage slept. Mizuki had told her where to find the scroll at and she was determined not to fail at this. She would prove to everyone that she had what it took to become a Shinobi.

Coming to a stop two houses down from the Hokage's she crouched low, cloaking her Chakra ahead of time. This was something that she was actually good at, it wouldn't fool the Hokage but it would make it less likely for the Hokage to detect her right away. If she was lucky she would be able to get to the scroll before she was detected. Then all she had to do was disappear before he could stop her.

She wasn't stupid enough to think she'd be able to get out before he noticed her. Jumping onto the next roof over she pushed her back close to the wall and scooted along it quietly. Reaching the window she eased it open and slipped through before closing it. The room was lit up which bothered Naruko but she gracefully walked across the room, refusing to make a single sound.

Making it down the hallway she was able to find the room that the scroll was placed in. Sighing out in relief of not being caught yet she crouched down and searched through the wall of scrolls. It was amazing that she hadn't been found out yet, surely any moment jii-san would walk through that door and demand to know what she was doing.

Starting to feel anxious that he could come in at any moment caused her to search faster. "Found it," she whispered as she fastened it to her back. A floorboard creaked causing her to swing around in fear.

"Naruko what are you doing here?" jii-san asked causing her to freeze up. Gasping she finally drug herself out of it as she stood up to her feet.

"Sorry, jii-san but I gotta pass," she said as she spun around and disappeared out of the window. Knowing that the Hokage knew that she had it she needed to get to the meet up place fast. She wouldn't have very long to study it before the end of the exam.

Racing toward the forest she quickly came to a cabin and sat back against the nearest tree. Now all she had to do was wait, and in the meantime she could get down to studying. Glancing through the scroll she came across something interesting, the shadow clone jutsu. Eagerly she dug into the scroll going through the motions and trying to learn it before Iruka-sensei showed up.

It took longer for Iruka sensei to find her than she thought, half a day had passed already but it was more than enough time for her to learn the shadow clone jutsu. Falling back onto the forest ground she huffed as she tried catching her breath. It had taken a lot out of her but she had done it. She could make a shadow clone successfully!

A satisfied grin spread across her weary face as she giggled lightly at the ground. Her fingers burrowed into the dirt as she felt satisfied with herself. She had done it, surely now she could become a Shinobi.

"I've found you," came Iruka sensei's voice but she felt like it held an undertone of disapproval.

"They're you are Iruka-sensei!" she said no longer feeling tired as she jumped to her feet. Smiling widely she placed her hands behind her head and shot her sensei a giddy look. "You've found me, I've only learned one thing, though I thought you would be here a long time ago."

Iruka glanced over her in worry as he saw a light sheen of sweat and exhaustion coat her face. She had dirt and grime littering her body, there wasn't a clean space on her. It seemed she had been working hard on something, his eyes scrunched in worry.

"You look all beat up, what are you doing here?" Naruko cocked her head to the side in confusion but Mizuki did say he would act like he didn't know what she was saying. He was a pretty good actor. Bouncing on her feet she grabbed at Iruka's hand wanting him to be completely focused on her when she showed him what she could do.

"Oh don't you worry sensei! I'm going to try this awesome jutsu and when I do you'll let me graduate. Alright!" Iruka frowned as he watched her not believing that she had just been out here practising all day. He was worried that even though she had been practising, it had damaged her body pretty badly in the process.

Glancing behind her he noticed the scroll that she had been said to have taken. Frowning he stared down at the blonde. "Naruko, where did you get that scroll?"

"Mizuki sensei told me about it, and about this place as well. I was suppose to come here with it. He said if I show you this jutsu that I would defiantly graduate!" Iruka froze not believing that Mizuki had told her to do this. Tensing he could hear something moving through the air, and jumping into action his first instinct was to protect Naruko.

Reaching out he shoved against her chest using Chakra to push her as far back as possible not thinking about keeping from bruising her. Naruko shocked at what just happened kept her eyes trained on her sensei as several kunai impaled him to the cabin wall. She gasped as she landed in a crouch rubbing at her chest where she was shoved.

She watched as Iruka bled from the wounds that the Kunai inflicted. They pinned him against the wall keeping him from moving. She winced at how painful it looked but it was worse at the next words she heard.

"Nice job finding the moron!" Mizuki said from the tree's causing Naruko to flinch. His words hurt her, why would he say such a thing? Why was he attacking Iruka sensei, her precious person. None of it made sense to her causing her head to spin.

Naruko, give me the scroll," Mizuki said but Naruko wasn't sure that was a very good idea. He had attacked them, surely that meant that he was the enemy. But it was Mizuki sensei!

"Naruko!" Iruka yelled at her as he pulled himself free from the kunai. Many were still impaled inside his body causing her to flinch in worry. He sure had lost a lot of blood. "Whatever happens don't give him the scroll! Do you understand! The scroll has dangerous forbidden ninjutsu written in it. Mizuki used you to get his hands on it!"

Mizuki smirked as he rounded on Naruko planning on telling her one thing he was sure to make her turn her back on the Leaf village.

"Naruko there's no point in you having it, I'll tell you the truth." Confusion was now all Naruko felt, as she stared at the white haired Chunin.

"No!" Iruka screamed as blood ran down his mouth. He didn't want her to find out about this.

Naruko frowned turning to look at iruka now, what did he not want her to know?

"Twelve years ago I'm sure you know about the demon fox being sealed right?" Naruko stared up at him in confusion wondering how that had anything to do with her, and why Iruka didn't want her to hear about it. "Since that day a special rule was created for this village."

Naruko frowned, she had never heard about any rule. "What rule? Why haven't I never heard about it."

"Well of course, this rule was never meant to be told to you. You couldn't know about it. The Leaf Village has hidden quite a big thing from you."

"Why couldn't I know? Tell me!" Mizuki smirked liking how confused and betrayed she already looked. He was going to break her, and take pleasure in doing so.

"The rule is that nobody is allowed to talk about the fact that you are the nine tailed demon fox!"

Naruko froze, her eyes widening in horror and shock. How could she not know about this? Why had they kept this a secret from her all these years! Her body tensed as she could feel the betrayal run through her veins. Jii-san had kept this from her, she thought she could trust him. Even Iruka-sensei didn't want her to hear about it.

He's screaming at Mizuki even right now not to tell her. They all had betrayed her, kept such a huge secret from her. Everyone hated her because of this, everyone knew but her. She had been a fool.

"You're the nine tailed demon fox that killed Iruka's parents and destroyed the village." Naruko flinched at the thought of being the reason that Iruka-sensei didn't have any parents. She had been the one to take them away from him even if it wasn't her directly. She housed the reason inside her body, surely that was enough reason for Iruka to hate her.

She was too shocked to do anything as the information filtered throughout herself. "Stop it!" Iruka yelled. However Mizuki was just getting started, he wanted to see her fall too pieces before he killed her.

"You were sealed up by the Hokage you admired, even loved, and you have been lied to by everyone!"

"Stop!"

"Didn't you find it odd how everyone hates you? Iruka is the same! He also hates you!" Flinching Naruko could feel the tears streaming down her face as she felt despair, pain, and even anger. Standing up she yelled out while dirt kicked up around her in her fit of rage. "Nobody will ever love you! That scroll was used to seal you up!"

In a split second Mizuki grabbed his oversized Shuriken and flung it at Naruko, seeing how broken she was, and knew it was the time to get rid of her. Iruka saw his movements and gathering all of the strength he had flung himself across the clearing, shoving Naruko back down on the ground, and crouched over her body. Protecting her from being impaled by the weapon and instead taking the brunt force himself.

Shocked Naruko stared up at him watching as pain flickered across his face. Tears began to stream down her face harder, Iruka was once again hurt because of her.

"Why?" she sobbed out.

"My," he gasped out, blood spraying from his lips, landing on her face. "My parents after they died, there was nobody to… compliment or acknowledge me...since I wasn't good in doing things like learning or doing homework… I kept acting like an idiot, it was better than being nothing… it was so painful. Naruko, you also must have been in a lot of pain." By this point Iruka was crying, tears washing the blood from her face as she stared wide eyed up at him. "I'm sorry Naruko, if I only did a better job… you wouldn't have to feel like this."

Feeling overwhelmed and not sure who to believe, or even trust at this point she did the only thing that made sense. She ran. Crawling out from underneath Iruka she wiped at her tears and took off in the opposite direction, taking the scroll along with her.

Behind her she could hear Iruka-sensei yelling at her to come back but her feet kept carrying her farther and farther away. She had to get away from them, had to clear her mind. Everything was upside down and made no sense.

She ran further and further into the forest her mind spinning around in circles. Sprinting from tree to tree she soon had to come to a crashing halt as her tears kept her from seeing where she was going. Landing down at the base of a tree she shoved her back against the trunk and froze when she heard voices. Her breathing was labored but she forced it to calm down as she masked her Chakra.

She didn't want them to know that she was there.

"I can't believe you'd even transform into what killed your parents to protect her."

"She won't hand the scroll over to someone like you!"

"You idiot, Naruko and I are the same." Naruko upon hearing about this grew angry. She would never betray her village, trick a kid to get a scroll, like he did. "If you use the skills in that scroll you can do whatever you want! There's no way that demon wouldn't use the power of the scroll. Unlike what you're assuming."

"Yeah." Naruko froze when she heard Iruka say that. Even her precious person thought that she was a demon and would do anything to destroy. Even he didn't acknowledge her. "The demon fox would do that but Naruko is different, she is. I've acknowledged her as one of my excellent students!"

Naruko froze clutching at the scroll tightly, almost not believing her ears. "She may not be the hardest worker, and she is clumsy, and nobody accepts her. She already knows what it is to feel pain inside her heart, but she isn't the demon fox, she is a member of the Hidden Leaf Village. She is Uzumaki Naruko!"

By this point she was once again crying her eyes out. That was how Iruka really felt about her. He didn't hate her like she had thought.

Grabbing his Shuriken again Mizuki threw another had him causing more blood to pour from Iruka's body. "Iruka I said I would take care of you later, but I've changed my mind. Now you can die!" He aimed his weapon letting it slide from his fingers but at the last second Naruko flung herself from her hiding spot and kicked off from the ground. Her right foot swung through the air and connected with Mizuki's chin flinging him back.

The oversized Shuriken went off course and instead of hitting Iruka cut through a limb of a tree instead.

"Naruko you shouldn't have done that," Iruka said feeling worried for his student. Mizuki now knew she was here, he would go after her next.

Standing up she leaned against the scroll her face facing the ground. Her eyes were in shadow as she stared up at Mizuki. Anger boiled in her blood at the thought of anyone trying to touch Iruka.

"Don't touch Iruka-sensei! I'll kill you!" She yelled out her voice calm not wavering one bit with her anger.

Behind her Iruka was feeling scared. She was going to get herself killed, there was no way she stood a chance up against Mizuki. "You idiot! Run away! Hide!"

"I'll kill someone like you in one shot!" Mizuki yelled getting fed up with Naruko's antics. It was time to end her.

Naruko smirked wanting to finish this fight quickly and she knew exactly how to do that. That new jutsu she had learned should do the trick.

"Then do it demon fox!" Her blood boiled at the name as she quickly went through the hand motions for the shadow clone jutsu. Hundreds of Naruko's filled up the forest. They were surrounded by orange and blue figures, hanging from the tree's, filling up any space on the forest ground. Iruka and Mizuki looked amazed at how many she had produced, and that she could even do it.

Naruki feeling cocky glanced over at the frightened Mizuki as she smirked down at him. All her clones copied her movements as they all got ready to fight the Chunin.

"What's wrong Mizuki?" she asked playfully. "Weren't you going to kill me with one shot?" When he didn't answer she did for him. "Well, I'll start then." Naruko flung herself at Mizuki along with all of her clones. They all fought to get in a punch and Mizuki wasn't a match for all the blonde girls. In the end he laid on the ground passed out, blood leaking onto the dirt beneath him.

"I think I went a little too far," Naruko said as she dispelled the jutsu and turned to glance back at Iruka. Sitting up even though he was still in pain he still wanted to congratulate her. She had passed in his eyes.

"Naruko come over here, there's something I want to give you," Iruka said motioning for her to come closer as he sat up. Curious Naruko did as she was told covering the several feet to stand in front of him. She still kept enough space between them to be respectful. "Close your eyes."

Feeling a little weird about closing her eyes she did as told anyway. Iruka had proven to be someone she could trust. He wouldn't hurt her or let any harm come to her.

She could hear a rustling and something metal click. "You can open your eyes," he said. Slowly she opened them wondering what he had in store for her. She noticed that he had taken his forehead protector off which only confused her.

"Sensei what are you doing?" she asked but he didn't answer as he tied it around her forehead. Staring at him she had frozen wondering what this meant.

"Congratulations on graduating!" Iruka yelled. He had expected her to be happy but she just stood there staring at him. He began to grow worried that after everything that happened she was shock.

It was quite the opposite actually, inside she was dying of happiness, but on the outside nothing showed. She was forcing herself to not cry, she couldn't lose it right now.

"Let's celebrate!" Iruka said trying to get an reaction from her. "I'll buy you a cup of ramen.!" Naruko's lip began to quiver which caused Iruka to stare at her but that didn't alert him to what she did next.

Without saying a word Naruko flung herself the short distance between them and wrapped her arms around his neck. Tears had finally fell from her face.


	2. Passing

**Chapter Two**

 **Passing**

 **Just to let you guys know, I will be changing Naruko's attitude up just a little. she will still have the brash attitude at times but she will just be a little more level headed. So if she seems a little ooc, that is what I'm going for. This is after all a female version of Naruto. so there will be some differences in attitude.**

 **Also I will be changing some scenes to my liking. Not everything will go exactly the way it did in the manga. But it will still follow closely with it.**

 **Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto only the things you do not recognize**

Naruko glanced nervously around her as she once again fiddled with her headband. She had refused to wear it until today, in fear that she would mess it up. The headband meant more to her than just proof that she was a ninja of Konoha, it had been Iruka-sensei's as well, the first person to truly believe in her. Adjusting the headband around her neck one last time she stepped into the classroom where many of her classmates were already picking seats.

A smile of excitement passed over her face as she quickly sat in a random seat by a dark haired boy that she barely glanced at. It hardly mattered who was sitting beside her when soon she would be placed on a team and actually doing ninja things. Placing her head against the table she tried to contain her excitement until Iruka-sensei showed up to announce who was being placed where.

"Could you move so I can sit on the other side of you," a pink haired girl asked. Naruko glanced up at her and instantly knew who she was. Haruno Sakura. Which meant if she wanted to sit next to Naruko that there was someone important on her other side. Glancing to her left she almost groaned out loud when she noticed it was Uchiha Sasuke. He would only draw unwanted attention her way just because she was sitting near him.

The other girls would think it was her trying to get on the Uchiha's good side so that she could date him. That was the farthest thing from the truth as she found him annoying.

"Naruko! Move your ass." Glaring at the pink haired girl Naruko stood her ground not appreciating that she was trying to use force against her. If she had waited a second she would have moved now, she wasn't too sure she wanted too.

"Hmm!" Naruko said crossing her arms and glaring at Sakura as she planted herself firmly in her seat.

Getting tired of the blonde's antics Sakura shoved herself forward, shoving her hand in the other girls face and pushing her back out of the chair and onto the floor. Naruko tumbled to the ground in a heap, her glare heating up even more as she watched Sakura slide into the seat next to Sasuke and stare at him.

"Sasuke-kun can I sit next to you?" the girl asked not even waiting for an answer. Sasuke not answering her stared ahead trying to ignore her stares.

Picking herself off of the ground Naruko pulled herself back into her seat. Brushing her bangs back she fixed her headband so that it kept them from getting into her eyes. Turning to stare at Sakura she let the anger that the other girl dared to push her flood through her veins.

"What the hell, Sakura!" Naruko yelled as she flung herself at the pink haired girl. Panicking Sakura flung herself off her seat and ducked onto the floor to avoid being hit just as Sasuke turned around to see what was going on beside him. Naruko tripping over Sakura's now cowering body, her eyes widened when she fell into Sasuke and their lips met.

The twelve year old girl froze as she stared into the black eyes of a startled Sasuke. After several seconds of being frozen in shock Naruko nor Sasuke moved away from each other until Sakura yelled out in anger.

"Naruko! I'm going to kill you!" Flinging her body back onto the table Naruko was still wide eyed as she began to blush. Sasuke glared at the blue eyed girl but he himself was beginning to darken. Sakura was mentally freaking out at the fact that the blonde had stolen Sasuke's first kiss.

"Shut up Sakura," Naruko hissed as she slid off of the table and back onto her seat as she laid her head down in embarrassment. She could feel the stares of not only Sakura but all of the other angry fangirls in the room.

Before anything more could be said or done Iruka-sensei walked into the room capturing everyone's attention. Sakura still stared at her angrily from beside her as Naruko tried to forget what just happened.

Not realizing what just happened Iruka began to talk at once. "Starting today, all of you are real Shinobi. But you are still genin, the hard journey that lies ahead has just started. Now you will soon receive missions to help the village so today we will create the three man teams, and each team will have a jounin sensei. You will follow his or her instructions to successfully complete your missions."

This caught Naruko's attention as she wanted to to know her team already not caring who she was with. Though Sakura wouldn't be missed if she wasn't placed on the girls team.

"Team ten is made up of Nara Shikamaru, Yamanaka Ino, and Akimichi Chouji." Iruka said as he glanced down at his clipboard. "The next team is Inuzuka Kiba, Aburame Shino, and Hyuuga Hinata. The cell after that is Naruko Uzumaki, Haruno Sakura, and Uchiha Sasuke."

Naruko froze as she listened to what Iruka-sensei had to say. Sakura would surely try to get her killed now that she had kissed Sasuke, and being around the dark haired Uchiha was going to make her die from embarrassment after what happened. Trying to get out of her team she jumped up from her seat and pointed at Sasuke without looking at him.

She was afraid she would start blushing again if she stared at him. "Iruka-sensei!" she said staring at the older man. "Why do I have to be on the same team as that prick over there?" She actually had nothing against the boy but the idea of being around someone she accidentally kissed was terrifying to her.

"Sasuke's grades were the best of all twenty-seven graduates and yours were dead last," Iruka said. Naruko almost flinched at the words, dead last, and almost wished she hadn't said a thing. "Do you understand we have to do this to balance the teams… right?" He realized how harsh he had sounded and wanted to try to lessen his words.

Sitting back in her seat Naruko didn't speak up again.

~3~

One by one her classmates disappeared with their jounins and soon Naruko was pacing the classroom. It had been hours since the last team had left and she was growing antsy. Sakura and Sasuke followed her with their eyes, one out of boredom and the other still pissed from earlier. Sakura's green eyes were digging into her back only causing her to walk faster around the room. Where was their sensei? How could he be hours late, was this a sign that her team would forever be doomed. It didn't seem to start out very well with who she had been put with so far.

"Naruko just sit down," Sakura said with a scathing look.

"I just don't understand why he has to be so late," Naruko said while turning around but instead of looking at Sakura her eyes fell onto the chalkboard. Walking over to the board and grabbing an eraser before walking back over to the door. Since she was a little on the short side she grabbed a stool so she was able to place it over the door.

"This will teach him to be late," Naruko said with a big smile as she hopped down from the stool and placed it back in the corner.

"What are you doing Naruko," Sasuke said his dark eyes glaring into her.

"He really shouldn't be late," she said. "So I'm going to prank him."

"Like a jounin would fall for that," Sasuke said with a shake of his head.

"But it's so simple," she said quickly taking a seat in the back row. "He'll never see it coming."

A moment later and they could hear footsteps approaching the classroom. Naruko sat up straighter not wanting to miss their sensei fall for the prank. Sasuke kept his chin resting on his hands and pretended not to be interested. In reality he was curious about whether or not the jounin would actually fall for it.

Sakura looked worried not wanting to get in trouble for something she wasn't a part of.

In the next moment a hand reached in pulling the door open and following that hand was a messy, gravity defying, mess of grey hair. Naruko instantly started laughing as she pointed at the jounin.

"You shouldn't have been late it's rude you know," she said as the unnamed jounin stared into the room at his three possible students.

"How can I say this," the silver haired jounin began. "My first impression is I don't like you guys." With these words Naruko stopped laughing as she stared at her new sensei. Honestly she felt like that should be what they were feeling. He had been the one late not them. "Meet me on the roof in five minutes." With those words he disappeared leaving the three students alone.

Up on the roof Naruko had shoved her way in before Sakura and Sasuke could get in. Sakura sent her a dirty look but sat down on the steps. Sasuke sat down between the two girls and even though he seemed a little annoyed by the blonde's antics he didn't show it.

Watching the kids get settled he waited until they were sitting down to say anything. "We're going to begin with some introductions, to get to know one another better," the jounin said.

"What do you want to know?" Sakura asked as she pulled her legs up and wrapped her arms around them.

"How about your likes, dislikes, dreams for the future, hobbies, you know things like that." Naruko frowned as she stared at him. She wasn't going to tell this man anything about herself until he did first.

"Hey," Naruko began a frown still on her face. "Why don't you introduce yourself to us first? We don't know anything about you at all."

For once Sakura seemed to agree with the blonde on something because she too was sending the clad face jounin a suspicious look. "You look kind of suspicious." Their sensei however seemed sort of surprised that they were so suspicious of him but took it with stride.

"Oh me?" he asked innocently. "My name is Hatake Kakashi. I have no desire to tell you guys about my likes and dislikes. Dreams for the future." He paused but didn't go on about his dreams. "Hmm. Well, I have lots of hobbies." Sakura frowned with the knowledge they hadn't learned except for his name.

"So all we learned was his name?" she said turning to the blonde and Sasuke.

"It makes sense," Naruko said whispering back. "He is a jounin. They don't tend to just come out with personal information." Before Sakura or Sasuke could say anything Kakashi went on.

"Now it's your turn, from the right," he said pointing at Naruko to start.

Looking up startled that she had been called on first, Naruko sat up straighter and straightened her headband absentmindedly.

"Oh, well, my name is Uzumaki Naruko," she began trying to come up with what she would say. She had been hoping to be called on last or at least second. "I like cup ramen, and what I like even more than that is the restaurant ramen Iruka-sensei buys me. What I dislike is waiting three minutes for the ramen to cook." She wasn't going to say that her real dislike was how the villagers were rude and mean to her.

"My dream is to surpass the Hokage! And then have all the people of this village acknowledge my existence" Kakashi gazed at the small blonde and couldn't believe how she had grown. Unknowingly she wanted to follow in her father's footsteps. If only he was allowed to tell her that. "Hobbies I guess would be training and pranks."

"Next," Kakashi said turning his eye on Sasuke.

"My name is Uchiha Sasuke. There are tons of things I dislike but I don't really like anything." This caused Sakura's face to fall as she was hoping he'd hint at liking her. "And I don't want to use the word 'dream' but I have an ambition. The resurrection of my clan and to kill a certain man."

Naruko stared at Sasuke weirdly wondering how someone his age could already want to kill someone, and to be able to say it so calmly. Kakashi only taking a moment to stare at the black haired Uchiha then turned to Sakura, motioning for her to go.

"And lastly the girl," he said.

"I'm Haruno Sakura, the thing I like is." she pauses and giggles as she stares at Sasuke. "Well.. the person I like is… um should I say my dream for the future..? My hobby is." Giggles again before turning to Naruko and glaring at her. "The thing I dislike is Naruko!"

Feeling hugely offended at being called a thing Naruko glared at the pink haired girl. "Hey! I'm not a thing, I'm a person!" Before anyone could do anything more Kakashi stepped forward to intervene sensing the fight that was about to start. He could already tell he was going to have a long way to get these kids to fight like a team.

"With that done, tomorrow we are going to start our duties." Naruko perked up at his having not been able to wait for this moment. This was what she was looking forward too.

"What kind of duties?" she asked standing up in excitement. Kakashi moved back to sit on the railing as he stared at the three of them. His one eye stared at them as he told them what they would be doing.

"First we are going to do something with just the four of us."

"Well what is it?" Naruko asked starting to get annoyed.

"Survival training." All three of them stared at him in confusion, survival training made no sense. They had been doing that for the last four years, why would they continue to do that.

"Survival training?" Naruko asked as she tilted her head to the side in confusion.

"Why is our first duty a training?" Sasuke asked in annoyance.

"We've had enough training at the academy," Sakura said.

"This isn't normal training," Kakashi explained. "This time I'm your opponent." Kakashi began to stifle is laughs trying to not startle his students.

"What's so funny sensei?" Sakura asked perplexed.

Kakashi coughs trying to clear his throat. "Well I'm just going to say that when I tell you this you guys are totally going to freak out." Naruko felt even more confused than ever wishing he would just come out and say it already.

"Freak out?" she asked. "Can't you just say it already?"

"Out of the twenty-seven graduates only nine will be chosen to become a genin, the rest will be sent back to the academy. This training is a very difficult exam it has a fail rate of over 66%!" Kakashi's face had darkened considerably as he told his students this and all three of them became worried about their future.

Naruko looked started, there was a possibility she could be sent back to the academy. That would mean it would take even longer for her to become the Hokage! Worry and fear began to cloud her mind as she stared at her new sensei.

"I told you, you'd freak out," Kakashi said while he eye smiled at his students. Naruko's fear began to edge away as she stared at him and in it's place was anger and determination.

"What no way!" Naruko yelled standing to her feet and glaring at Kakashi. "But we worked so hard! What was the point of graduating, it's not fair!"

"Well the graduation ceremony was just to select those who have the chance to become a genin. Anyway tomorrow you have to show your skills in the training grounds. Bring all the Shinobi tools you have. And skip breakfast, you might throw up."

Naruko stared down at the ground in worry, knowing that she would have to prove to Kakashi that she was strong and would make a great Shinobi. She would not be sent back to the academy. Not after everything she had done to graduate.

"The details are on this paper," Kakashi said handing them each a piece of paper. "And don't be late tomorrow." Taking the paper from Kakashi, Naruko stared down at the single page as her eyes set in determination. She would practise all night if that's what it took. She would pass this test, she would not fail. Going back to the academy couldn't happen.

~3~

The next day Naruko woke up early feeling the late night making it harder for her to pull herself out of bed. Rubbing at her eyes she sat up and pulled back the covers. It was still dark outside her window but she knew before too much longer it would start to lighten. Sighing she slid out of bed and grabbed her normal clothing out of her closet. Then she grabbed a towel so she could quickly take a shower.

She had woken up an hour before the time to meet up with everyone and knew that she had plenty of time. Quickly scrubbing at her body she then shampooed her hair to get it clean. Without being in the pigtails it reached past her butt, she wasn't willing to cut it off. Even if it could possibly get in the way during missions she was far too attached to the length. After drying herself off and pulling on her usual orange Kimono top, orange shorts, and the blue apron skirt. Then she pulled on her ninja boots, gloves, and headband. Underneath her clothes she wore the usual ninja mesh gear.

After brushing her hair and pulling it into pigtails she glanced over at her clock. If she left now she would make it on time to the meeting spot. The sun was just beginning to peak over the horizon and lighting the village.

Surprisingly she was the first one to make it to the meeting point. In just a few more minutes she was sure everyone else would be here. Setting down her pack she sat down next to it, wanting to get a few more minutes of rest in before they needed to fight. Footsteps alerted her to the fact that she was no longer alone.

Cracking open her eyes she looked to see who it was. Almost groaning she noticed it was Sasuke, what happened yesterday was still bright in her mind. Refusing to blush about the incident she glared at him instead before going back to closing her eyes. It wasn't long before she heard Sakura show up and began trying to get Sasuke to talk to her. Instead she found that Sasuke seemed more annoyed with the pinkette more than anything.

Hours past and Naruko was beginning to believe their sensei being late was going to become a habit. It was only a couple of hours before twelve and they still hadn't seen him.

"Good morning," Kakashi stated as he waved at them.

"You're late!" all three students exclaimed in anger.

"Is this going to become a habit?" Naruko asked glaring at him slightly. Deciding to ignore the blondes question he turned to a stump and placed a alarm clock on top.

"Alright, team, it's set for noon. Here are two bells, your task is to take these from me before the time is up. Those who don't have a bell by noon get's no lunch." Naruko frowned now understand he had lied about why they shouldn't eat breakfast yesterday. He wanted them to be hungry, not because he was worried they would puke. He had lied to them, and they had believed him.

"I'll not only tie you to one of those stumps, but I'll also eat right in front of you. You only have to get one bell. There are only two so one of you will definitely be tied to the stump. However the person who doesn't take a bell fails so at least one of you will be sent back to the academy. If you want you can use Shuriken and Kunai. To succeed you will have to come at me with the intent to kill."

Naruko wasn't going to be stupid enough to think that any of them could actually hurt, let alone kill a jounin but she was going to give it her best try.

"You'll be in danger!" Sakura yelped. Naruko rolled her eyes. Kakashi once again decided to ignore one of his students.

"We'll start when I say." Naruko pulled out a kunai wanting to be ready for anything that might happen. Getting into a stance she stared at her sensei. "Begin!" Not wanting him to get in the first hit, Naruko decided if she acted first it would be the best.

Launching herself at the silver haired jounin she gripped her kunai tightly and made to slash at him. Instead of clashing with his flesh he reached out and gripped Naruko's wrist, pulling it back around to her neck where it aimed at the back of the blonde's head. Naruko froze at feeling the sensation of cold metal barely grazing her skin.

"It seems you're finally prepared to come at me with the intent to kill, so you've finally acknowledged me?" Kakashi said slightly impressed with that knowledge. "It seem like I'm beginning to like you guys."

Naruko taking his distraction by talking to them lifted her leg and hooked it around his own ankle, swiping it out from underneath him. Using the moment of his body falling she went down with him. Before they hit the ground she twisted out of his grip and jumped away, finding cover in nearby bushes. As soon as she was hidden she masked her Chakra, not wanting him to find her before she was ready.

Crouching low she swept her eyes over the open area trying to see where Kakashi or any of the others went. Kakashi seemed to had hid as soon as Naruko had disappeared. She couldn't even find any of her other teammates.

Taking a moment to think she thought over what she had been told about the task so far. Only two people could get a bell and whoever didn't would be sent back. She was determined not to be the person who was sent back but also knew that she would never be able to get a bell on her own.

Kakashi was far too strong, she had barely gotten away and even that was all by luck. It was decided then, she would have to pick Sasuke or Sakura to team up with. It was the only way they would have a chance to even get a bell.

Sakura was out of the question, she would never be able to get the other girl to agree and they'd probably just end up fighting the whole time .Sasuke would be the only one she could work with as long as she could talk him into it first.

Checking if the coast was clear she slipped out of the bush and took off running through the tree's. She had to find Sasuke, before noon, and time was slipping away. Coming to a stop she watched as Sasuke was already in battle with Kakashi. She seemed to have stumbled on them toward the end of it. A fireball was shot out of Sasuke's mouth barely missing Kakashi as he ducked out of the way, and disappeared into the ground. Naruko gasped as she saw Sasuke looking around but refused to scream out.

If she gave up her location too soon Kakashi would know where she was and then her plan wouldn't be able to happen at all. Instead she watched as Kakashi pulled Sasuke into the earth and left him there. As soon as he left more than likely looking for Naruko herself, or Sakura she dashed to the dark haired Uchiha.

"Sasuke," Naruko said crouching down by his head.

"What are you doing here?" he asked glaring up at her.

"I've come to get your help," she said. "If we work together we can get those bells. Neither one of use will be sent back to the academy."

"Just get me out of here," Sasuke said and even though he hadn't agreed to help Naruko nodded and helped get him out.

"So are you willing to work with me?" Sasuke brushed himself off and stared at the blonde, his eyes staring daggers into her own. "With your fireballs and my shadow clones we've got a chance. Come on it's in your best interest."

"I don't need your help to get those bells," he said. "I almost got them."

"But you didn't did you," Naruko said glaring right back at him. She couldn't believe how stubborn he could be.

"Awe, are you two planning on going up against me together," Kakashi said staring down at them from a tree. "Teaming up not a bad idea." Sasuke turned to look at Naruko and nodded silently saying he would work with her. He'd be going after them both now anyway.

Smiling widely she put her hands together and quickly went through the signs for the shadow clones. Twenty quickly filled the area around them as Naruko disappeared into the tree's, taking cover in them so she could watch for an opening. Sasuke instantly went into defense and began to firing fireballs at him again.

Sakura stumbling into the clearing after just seeing Sasuke die was startled at seeing him alive and fighting their sensei. Are eyes widened but quickly jumped into the fight, wanting to do anything she could to help her precious Sasuke-kun.

Naruko noticing Sakura join in knew they had to act fast or no one would get a bell. And with all three of them working together now, someone would have to take the fall and not get a bell. Finally seeing her opening as one of her clothes grabbed Kakashi from behind she jumped out of the tree, avoided being hit by a fireball and landed at Kakashi's feet. Just as he threw off her clone Naruko reached out and grabbed the bells.

Kakashi jumping back to avoid another fireball was surprised when he didn't feel the bells at his side but instead saw them in the hands of Naruko. The blonde jumped to stand next to Sakura and Sasuke looking quite proud of herself.

"We did it!" Naruko yelled and jumped up and down.

"Good job Naruko, Sasuke, and Sakura, but which of you will get the bells?" Kakashi asked with a smirk.

Naruko frowned glancing between Sasuke and Sakura. Even though the pink haired girl hadn't been a part of the plan she still had helped out. If it wasn't for her interfering she never would have been able to grab the bells.

Sighing she handed one to Sasuke and the other to Sakura. "Here you go you guys deserve it," she said a sad look covering her face. Sakura glanced down at the bell now in her hands. Even though she never got along with Naruko and thought she was the most annoying thing ever she still couldn't let the girl give up the bell.

She had won it fair and square, she had grabbed the bell not herself. And for that she couldn't just take it from her. "No, Naruko you take it," Sakura said holding it out to the other girl. "You deserve it." Naruko glanced up surprised as she stared at the bell being offered to her.

"No! Sakura I gave it to you." She shoved the pink haired girl's hands back toward herself. Sakura just shook her head and shoved it back. Sasuke getting tired of both of their bickering shoved his own into Naruko's hand.

"Ugh take it, I'm much stronger than both of you, if I get sent back I'll just be able to graduate again next year." Naruko frowned at the cockiness in his voice, the sound annoying her.

"Hey bastard I was trying to give mine away!" Naruko yelled. "I'm doing the right thing! I'm just as strong I can graduate again next year!" Before it could get more out of hand Kakashi stepped forward and took both of the bells.

"All three of you have passed!" he exclaimed loudly causing them to stop and stare in confusion.

"But sensei you said only two of us could pass," Sakura said.

"Yes, I did, but you guys understood what this test was all about. Teamwork. You worked as a team to beat me and that was how you were able to get the bells. I would have failed you if you hadn't worked together. You are the first to figure it out. Everyone else would just do whatever I told them. They were just morons. A ninja must see underneath the underneath. Those who break the rules and codes of the ninja world are called trash, but you know what? Those who don't take care of their comrades are lower than trash. Starting tomorrow team 7 will begin its duties. "

Naruko smiled widely at the thought that they had passed. All of them, she had been right about the teamwork but it did make her feel a little guilty that she hadn't originally planned on asking Sakura. Deciding that she would try to work on their relationship she happily trailed behind her teammates and sensei as he explained to them what they would expect out of tomorrow.

She was finally a real ninja, well on her way to becoming Hokage.


	3. Wave Mission Part 1

**Chapter Three**

 **Wave Mission Part 1**

 **Hi guys here's your chapter! So I have decided to keep it SasuNaru and to just go ahead at a later date make a GaaraNaru story.**

 **Hope you enjoy this and review for me!**

Naruko stared across the gates of Konoha wistfully as she waited for her teammates to arrive. For the past couple weeks they had been doing several D rank missions, that if Naruko was telling the truth, bored her out of her mind. There was only so many times that she could retrieve the same cat before it all became nerve wracking. Sure she had grown a bond with said cat, she even let it hang out at her apartment for several hours after catching it before giving it back to it's owner.

Still it wasn't testing her strength, didn't push her to be better, or learn new things. Kakashi had them train six days out of the week, and it helped push her but she just couldn't get over how she thought that an actual mission could help tremendously. She wanted the experience, craved it. But more than that she wanted to see what was outside the gates.

Then earlier in the morning she had finally gotten her wish! Jiji was allowing her and her team to go on an actual mission, she just couldn't believe it. Here was her chance to finally prove that she could actually be worth something. Naruko wouldn't just be dead last anymore. Pulling her pack over onto her other shoulder she felt how light it was. To anyone's eyes there would seem to be nothing but scrolls inside but she had been taught by jiji how to store things inside of them.

It took a little more Chakra than she normally used but thanks to her vast supply it hardly hurt her any. As long as she didn't run low on Chakra she would have anything she needed at hand. "I see you're early Naruko," Kakashi stated as he trailed behind Sasuke, Sakura, and their client.

"I see you're not late!" Naruko said with a cheeky smile as she pulled the other strap of her shoulder over her bag.

"Now, now, I wouldn't be late for a mission." Naruko eyed him thinking that at least he was on time for something. She then turned to the man they were escorting, Tazuna. Though she'd prefer to be escorting someone different as this man had a tendency to annoy her. Tazuna eyed her up once again taking in that she didn't look like very much what with her height.

"Am I really going to be safe with this brat?" he asked as Naruko glared angrily at him.

"If anything were to happen I am a jounin," Kakashi said eyeing the man himself. "Don't worry."

"Hey old man!" Naruko yelled growing angry with him but trying to reign it in. "I'm going to grow strong and become the Hokage someday, believe it! I can handle whatever is thrown my way! Remember the name Uzumaki Naruko!"

"I doubt someone like you would become one the Hokage, one of the strongest ninja in a village. You're just a little runt." Naruko shifted as anger reared up heavily before she shoved it back down. Yelling at him wouldn't make him believe her any. Calmness and proving to him, to them, would.

"I am prepared to do anything to become Hokage," Naruko said calmly as her cerulean blue eyes stared daggers at him. "And when I become Hokage you will acknowledge me."

Tazuna just laughed as he shook his head. His voice held no amusement just malice. "Even if you become Hokage I won't acknowledge you." He took a swig out of his bottle as he eyed the small blonde who seemed to only grow angrier at his words, but contained it well. Sensing a possible fight on the horizon Kakashi jumped into action announcing that it was time for them all to leave. Grumbling under her breath Naruko followed behind everyone.

Soon her grouchy mood was replaced with excitement as she took in the tree's outside the gates of Konoho. Soon she would see more, and finally experience being a true ninja. Throwing her hands back behind her head she walked beside Kakashi. Her posture was one of relaxation but her eyes never stopped searching the surrounding area around her.

They had been walking for a couple of hours and even though this was suppose to be a simple mission Naruko couldn't help but feel like something was going to happen. She could see Sasuke and Sakura walking only a couple of steps in front of them. It seemed the pinkette was still trying to get Sasuke to pay attention to her.

It almost caused her to snort in humor out how silly she thought the other girl was but didn't dare do it. Sakura hit hard and she wasn't looking forward to a bump on the head.

"Kakashi-sensei does the wave country have ninja's as well?" she asked finally giving up on trying to get Sasuke to speak to her. Kakashi focused his one uncovered eye on his student before shaking his head.

"Do not worry Sakura, the wave does not have ninja's. This is only a C-rank mission, we won't be running into any combat with other ninja's."

Sakura nodded looking thoughtful. "So we won't be running into any foreign ninja?"

Kakashi gave a little laugh as he shook his head again. "No we won't be running into any." Naruko frowned tensing up even more. She wanted to believe in her sensei's words but something was telling her she shouldn't. A prickling sensation stabbed at the back of her mind, almost like another presence was watching them.

Closing her eyes quickly she moved her senses out, trying to feel for another Chakra that shouldn't belong. As she opened her eyes her boots splashed in a puddle as she kept walking. "Water?" Naruko muttered to herself glancing down at her now wet feet. "But it hadn't rained." Her voice trailed off as her body tensed as a foreign Chakra lashed out behind her.

Using her own Chakra she jumped into the air as she twisted around coming to land next to Tazuna. She may not like the old man but he was her client, and that meant she had to protect him. As she landed in a crouch next to the old man her eyes widened at the scene that now lay in front of her. Two men had Kakashi chained up, both holding each end in their hands as they pulled tight.

"Kakashi-sensei!" Naruko yelled but didn't dare move from her spot. Fear plunged through her stomach and up her spine as she watched as the chained tightened and ripped through her sensei's body, throwing blood up into the air.

Her body began to shake as her grip on the kunai wavered her fingers barely keeping their grip on it. From on her other side she could hear Sakura scream out but nothing from the ever silent Sasuke. In a flash the two attackers were moving once again both heading straight for a frozen Naruko. She could sense their approach but her body seemed to be frozen, it wasn't responding to a thing she tried making it do.

Her muscles tensed as they drew nearer, the same chains that had shredded her sensei apart spinning toward her. Just as she felt a chain knick her skin a blur of blue and black filled her vision as Sasuke jumped between her and the attackers, deflecting their attacks. A hiss of pain left her lips at the intense pain in the palm of her hand.

Sasuke reached behind him shoving her back out of harm's way causing Naruko to finally force her muscles to move so she could catch herself. Blood dripped from her hand as she clutched it tightly with the other one trying to stop the blood flow. Sasuke threw a kunai pinning the chain to the tree as he jumped landing on both of their heads. Grabbing them he made to fling them away only they slipped through his grip, one going toward Naruko and the other toward Sakura and Tazuna.

Feeling her body wanting to freeze up again she watched as the man drew closer. Forcing herself to respond she gripped another kunai tightly in her uninjured hand waiting for him to get closer. Her eyes widened as the man in front of her seemed to stop mid run before being flung up into the air and over a familiar person's shoulder.

"Kakashi-sensei," she whispered sucking in a relieved breath. He hadn't died. Glancing over to her right she noticed the wood pieces that littered the dirt path. He had used the Kawamiri jutsu to get away, which she would have noticed if she hadn't frozen in fear.

"I apologize for not getting to you earlier, you were hurt," Kakashi began as he stared at Naruko. "I hadn't realized you were going to freeze. Sasuke good job." Naruko flinched at his words. She had frozen, had put her team in danger with not being able to do anything. Her first real battle had been a fail, if Kakashi hadn't been here it would have ended horribly, and part of it would have been her fault. Self doubt began to cloud her mind as she stared at Sasuke, who hadn't froze. He had stepped up and protected them all, even at the risk of his self.

Her fingers curled into fists. A stab of pain shot through the one that was hurt reminding her that she had been injured. Her eyes narrowed at Sasuke not believing that he could function normally but she had gone and screwed up.

Feeling eyes on him Sasuke turned to stare at Naruko. "You okay scaredy cat?" Sasuke said as he smirked at her. Naruko scowled at him her fingers curling into fists as she thought about hitting him over the head. He hadn't needed to point out her failure and it irritated her to hear him comment about it.

"Naruko," Kakashi said turning to look at the young girl, his eye trailing down to her hand. "Don't move, those claws were soaked in in poison. We need to remove it quickly." Her eyes lowered down to the wound, her eyes narrowed at it. "We need to open the wound and release the poison from your body."

Naruko stayed perfectly still as she kept glaring at the wound, hating it more and more as she listened to Kakashi talk to Tazuna. It was quickly explained how Tazuna had lied to them. Their C-rank mission should have been a B-rank. It was clear this mission would be above their experience.

Sakura began to worry as she stared at the others around her. She wasn't ready for a mission like this, it was more dangerous than they expected. These ninja had more experience than they did, this was their first fight and without Kakashi they would have died.

Quickly turning to Naruko her eyes landed on the wound and knew that to get out of doing the mission she would have to use the blonde haired girl. She would pretend to be more worried than she actually was to go back home.

"We're not ready for this mission, we need to quit," she said speaking up. "Naruko needs medicine for her wound. It would be more practical to go back to the village." Naruko frowned at the pinkette her eyes finally sliding away from her hand.

She would not allow their mission to be over just because of her. They could go on, she would prove it to them by taking care of her hand herself. Kakashi seemed to be leaning toward Sakura's idea.

"This might be too much," he said in agreement causing Naruko to bristle even more. Slipping a kunai from her weapon pouch she gripped it in her free hand and stabbed it through the wound, effectively opening it up so blood would once again run down her hand. The pain that flooded her hand was worse than the last.

The chains hadn't gone all the way through but this kunai did, cutting through muscle tissue, and bone. She bit back a gasp of pain refusing to show how much it hurt her. Everyone stared at her in shock. Sasuke took a step forward as shock of what she did coursed through his body.

"What are you doing Naruko!" Kakashi asked.

With her hand clutching the kunai that was still impaled in her wound she vowed to herself that no one would ever save her again. Especially not Sasuke Uchiha. She wouldn't run or try to hide ever again. Turning to stare up at the others she held up her injured hand, a smirk on her face. This was a promise, she wouldn't be weak again.

"With this kunai I'll protect the old man. We're going to continue with this mission." Her voice was held full of confidence. Kakashi smiled at the young girl as he took a step forward and grabbed her hurt hand. Taking the kunai out of the wound he grabbed a cloth and wrapped it around her hand.

"It's good that you got the poison out but you need to stop the bleeding Naruko," he said as he tied it. "Otherwise you'll bleed out." As he wrapped it up he stared in amazement at how fast the wound was healing. Already right in front of his eyes it was clearing up. Finishing up he patted the covered hand and gave her an eye smile. "There you go, it should be fine now."

"Thank you Kakashi-sensei." She glanced up at him sending him her best smile. Naruko placed her kunai back into her pouch as she raced to catch up to her group. Slowing down she found herself walking next to Sasuke.

"That was smart getting the poison out but you could have gone at it in a better way," Sasuke said as he kept his eyes forward.

"Shut up teme," she muttered.

 **~3~**

Naruko stared out at the water as they passed slowly in the boat. The mist was heavy in the air hiding them nicely from view. She began to think about what had been revealed to her over the last day. Tazuna had revealed that the man after him was very powerful and had a name for himself. They had all agreed to continue with the mission even though it had gotten seriously more dangerous.

She shifted in her spot next to the Uchiha. For the first hour they had traveled by boat she had been tense, uncomfortable with how close she was to him. However as time had gone on she was no longer worried by that. No one had uttered a word since they had turned off the motor and she wasn't about to break the silence now.

It came hard not to say anything when she saw the bridge. It was huge, she wasn't sure how they were going to finish it, but she'd make sure that the old man stayed alive to do it.

"We will be there soon," said the man who had brought them here. "We will go the way with more vegetation so that the enemies do not see us."

"Thank you," Tazuna whispered. Naruko stared around at the tunnel they moved through. Everything had been quiet since the attack. Not a sign of any other enemies had been made. It still put her on edge and she wasn't putting her guard down, not until this mission was over. She watched as the tunnel opened up to show a village that caused Naruko's eyes to widen in wonder.

It looked nothing like Konoha. Her first time out of the village was proving to be an interesting experience. The boat came to a dock and one by one they all climbed out. Naruko stared around at as Tazuna bid goodbye to the boat operator.

"Get me home safely," Tazuna said staring at the four ninja's. He may not believe that the kids could protect him but it was obvious that he would need all of them. Kakashi nodded his head keeping his eye on the road around them. The next ninja he was sure to attack wouldn't be a Chuunin but a Jounin.

Naruko could feel the worry wafting from her jounin sensei and because of that she would not let her guard down. If he was worried then they should be. This was a mission she would take seriously and would not fail. She would get more powerful, and become Hokage, and to do that this was an obstacle she had to beat.

Her eyes gazed over the tree's but inside she could sense a presence. However it seemed too small to be of any danger to them and she figured it was probably just a forest animal of some sort. Her hands however didn't stray from near her weapons pouch, there was something out there she was sure of it. A bush rustled to their left and Naruko spun around.

She stiffened a shuriken already ready in her hand to defend herself with. If she had too she would pull out her shadow clone technique. However she knew that Kakashi would be the first to take care of anything as he was the jounin and had more experience but if he needed help she would step in this time.

Taking a step forward Naruko was surprised when only a white rabbit bounced out happily munching on the grass. Frowning she glanced closer at the creature realizing that it was the wrong time of year for a white rabbit to be out.

"Sensei," she said catching Kakashi's attention. "That's a white rabbit but it's spring." Kakashi was proud of his student that she had caught onto that. He, himself had been wondering the exact same thing.

"It would seem their already here," he said getting into a protective stance. "Be on your guard." Naruko jumped into action readying her Kunai for whatever was about to come. Sakura and Sasuke who noticed their sensei and teammate tensing also got ready only slightly confused to what was going on.

Out of nowhere a huge sword came crashing through the tree's causing Naruko to jump forward and grab Sasuke, pulling him down with her. The sword crashed into a tree cutting half way through it before stopping. Following behind the weapon was a man the lower half of his face covered. He was sending out a lot of killing intent that caused Naruko to climb to her feet and stare at him in shock.

Sasuke who now stood beside her stared at the dead last in surprise that she had reacted so fast. His eyes wandered to the new arrival wondering who this man was. No one had very long to wonder as Kakashi spoke up.

"Well, well, if it isn't the Hidden Mist's Missing- Nin, Momochi Zabuza- Kun." How Kakashi said his name made Naruko think that this guy was way out of their league.

She wasn't sure if they would be able to take him on and knew that they would have to follow Kakashi's every command. As she took her spot next to Tazuna she was ready to do as she was told.

This time she would be ready to defend and not freeze up. She promised herself that.


	4. Wave Mission Part 2

**A Path Rewritten**

 **Chapter Four**

 **Wave Mission Part 2**

 **hi guys! Sorry I haven't updated in a while. I moved a couple months ago and don't have wifi so I have to use it at my aunt's house.**

 **Then I had my daughter two months ago and have been super busy with her. So I don't get to write unless she's asleep and I often sleep when she does. But Im able to write more often now so hopefully I can update more often too. So enjoy this chapter and review please!**

Standing in defense Naruko watched as Kakashi lifted his hand to uncover his eye. "It will be difficult unless I pull out this," Kakashi said revealing a blood red eye to his students. Sasuke's eyes narrowed, he knew what that was, and also knew that Kakashi shouldn't have it. It was a Uchiha bloodline, not something you came by naturally unless you were from his clan. That would mean he would of had to come by it in a different way.

Naruko gazed curiously not understanding what her sensei had just revealed and why Sasuke looked so disturbed by it.

"Ah, the famous Sharingan Kakashi," Zabuza stated as his fingers gripped around the oversized sword. "I'm sorry but the old man is mine. I'm sure you understand, it's just business."

Kakashi lifted his headband completely so it settled over his forehead. "You're job is to surround and protect Tazuna, do you understand? Do not enter the fight, this is your teamwork." Zabuza smirked as he swung his sword back behind him so it rested over his shoulder. A laugh erupted from the dangerous man.

"I already get to see the famous sharingan, I feel honored." Naruko still not understanding fully what a sharingan was spoke her question out loud not really meaning too.

"I don't understand what exactly is a Sharingan?" she asked in confusion.

"The ability in your eyes to read and defeat all types of genjutsu, taijutsu, and ninjutsu. But that's not the only ability that the Sharingan has." Another laugh erupted from Zabuza as he stared at Kakashi.

"The worst is the technique to copy an opponent's techniques once you see them," he said not seeming at all bothered by that knowledge. "When I was a member of the Hidden Mist's Assassination Team, I had kept a handbook, full of information on you. Its contents said 'the man who copied more than 1000 jutsu's, Copy Ninja Kakashi'."

Naruko looked over in amazement at her sensei, he was more powerful than she had given him credit for. The man didn't look it, but there was power hiding behind his lazy demeanor. She glanced back over to Zabuza who seemed to have grown impatient with all the talking that was going on. It seemed now that it had been explained he was itching to fight.

"I've grown tired of all this talking, it's time to fight," Zabuza said. "I've come to kill the old man if you are to stand in my way I guess I'll just dispose of you first." Faster than Naruko's eyes could keep up with Zabuza disappeared, leaving only leaves in his wake. Her eyes quickly searched the surrounding area for where their enemy went. The smallest sound of water rippling alerted Naruko to where the missing nin had gone. Spinning around she watched as Zabuza got into formation, holding his left arm up while his right fingers were held in front of his lips. "Hidden mist no jutsu!"

As soon as the words left his lips the enemy ninja seemed to disappear in a sea of mist causing Naruko to glance around and stand closer to Tazuna. She planned on taking care of the client like Kakashi-sensei had told them. She would take this serious, she would have to if they wanted to survive.

"He's gone!" Sakura yelped slightly shaking with fear. From in front of them Kakashi spoke, his eyes never stopping their search.

"Do not worry, he will come after me first," Kakashi said. "I'm the bigger threat, he'll want to get rid of me first. Momochi Zabuza was a member of the hidden mist, he was known as an expert in silent killing. You don't even notice until you are dead. I can't use the sharingan perfectly so I need you guys to be careful."

Naruko glanced around noticing the mist around them had begun to get thicker. It was harder to see now, she could barely make out where Kakashi was standing. She could sense him somewhere nearby but couldn't pinpoint Zabuza's exact location. She stepped closer to Tazuna not wanting Zabuza to be able to grab their client without her knowing. Naruko knew she was no match for the jonin ninja but would try her best. With Kakashi here she knew that he would protect them to the best of his ability.

"Eight choices," Zabuza's voice said leaking out from the mist. It was disconcerting to Naruko but she kept her cool. She could sense Sakura growing fearful but could barely make out the pink hair of her teammate even though they stood relatively close to each other. On her other side Sasuke stood rigid. "Liver, lungs, spine, cervical vein, neck vein, brain, kidneys, or the heart? Which one should I go after? Perhaps a different one for each of you."

Something in the air shifted as she watched Kakashi move. The killer intent flooded their little clearing causing Sasuke to begin to sweat, his grip on his kunai tightening. His eyes widened in fear that he desperately tried to shake off. His body shook lightly as he tried making out his surroundings.

"Sasuke," Kakashi said his voice drifting from out of the mist. "Don't worry, I'll protect you guys even if it kills me."His eyes widened in fear that he desperately tried to shake off. His body shook slightly as he tried making out his surroundings. Naruko's eyes widened at the thought that Kakashi would die. They would never make it if he did. Zabuza was much too powerful for them. "I don't let my comrades die."

"We will see about that," Zabuza said his voice coming from behind them. Naruko froze her eyes widening now that the killing intent was coming from behind her, exactly between her and Tazuna. At the same time that Sasuke and Sakura also realized they all three jumped away from the missing nin. As she was jumping through the air she spun around trying to find where Tazuna had gone so she could protect him.

Instead of finding Tazuna right away she spotted that Kakashi had made his way over to them but Zabuza had disappeared and reappeared behind their sensei. "Kakashi- sensei!" Naruko yelled as she jumped forward pushing chakra into her feet so it only took one jump to reach their client. "He is behind you!" She wished to help him more but remembered what Kakashi had said. They must protect Tazuna. That was their mission right now. Sasuke appeared next to Naruko ready to help her with defending the client.

Kakashi spun around with every intent to block the attack but was moments too late. Sakura froze in fear as she watched Zabuza swing his sword toward their sensei. Making contact with Kakashi's body he was split in half, only instead of blood being sprayed everywhere water was in its place. He had gotten away by using a water clone, Naruko noticed. Her eyes searched the area for her sensei and watched as he appeared out of nowhere behind Zabuza. A kunai ready in his hand pointing directly at Zabuzas neck.

"It's over," Kakashi said. Naruko smiled widely at what her sensei just did. However her smile didn't last very long when the area around them was filled with killing intent once more.

"It's over?" Zabuzas said with a laugh. It caused Naruko's defences to go up instantly. "You really don't get it do you? There is no way you could defeat me with those monkey like imitations." Naruko's eyes widened as he explained what Kakashi had done to fool Zabuza. She hadn't even notice him make the switch with the clone, which of course wasn't hard to miss in this mist. "It's honestly to bad for you that I'm not that easy to fool." Naruko watched as Zabuza's body transformed into water, falling to the ground forming a puddle. He had also been a water clone.

Zabuza swung is sword toward Kakashi's body but the silver haired jonin ducked pushing his body to the floor to dodge the attack. The sword flew over his body landing with a thunk into the ground. Zabuza used that force to push against the sword and kick out his foot catching Kakashi in surprise as he was thrown back toward the water. Naruko's eyes widened as her sensei fell back into the water with a splash, Zabuza jumping after him, but landing gracefully on top of the water instead of sinking.

"Sensei!" Naruko yelled out as she stood by her comrades. Kakashi stood up from within the water, droplets cascading down from him, but something was off, the water felt heavy. Zabuza stood over him, laughter and malice shown brightly in his eyes and fell from his mouth as his fingers began to form new signs.

"Suirou No Jutsu: Water Prison Technique," Zabuza said as he finished the hand signs. Instantly the water around Kakashi began to move and swirl forming around the jonin and trapping him. With his hand inside of the water Zabuza turned his attention toward the genin and bridge builder. "Now that your under control we can finish our fight later, first I'll dispose of your students." Using only his one free hand he quickly formed more signs. "Mizu Bunshin No Jutsu: Water Clone Technique." From the water sprang an exact copy of Zabuza, the clone pulled itself from the depths of where it was made and began walking toward them.

The clone began to talk to them. "Wearing those headbands and acting like ninjas. A real ninja is someone who has survived numerous brushes with death." Naruko watched the clone closely as she was the closest person to it. She was sure he would attack her first, she just couldn't be sure when. The clone lowered it's head but she could tell he had tensed, getting ready to jump into action. Naruko stood in a fighting stance getting ready, she would either defend herself or help defend her comrades. "Only when you're good enough to be in my book can you be called ninjas. You are not ninjas!" He disappeared in an instant causing Naruko to quickly glance around trying to find where he had gone.

However before she was able to figure that out a flash of pain exploded across her head. She felt her headband that Iruka-sensei had given her fly from her head as she skidded through the air. Blood flew from her mouth as she tried thinking through the pain. She barely felt her body hit the ground as her head was spinning and it was hard for her to think let alone feel, or get things working right.

She could hear Kakashi yelling at them to get away, to flee and leave him there. Her head slowly stopped spinning but now that she could think clearly again fear was building up inside of her again. She could feel panic like with the other kiri-nin build up inside of her causing her to want to flee like Kakashi had said for them to do.

This guy was a jonin, a real ninja, and she was sure if she stuck around she would be dead. Naruko scrambled back her hands reaching behind her to move away from the enemy. Once she pushed herself over and her left hand touched the ground to push herself up she could feel another dull pain from long ago. One she had almost forgotten about.

Glancing down at the bandaged hand she froze as the memory of being wounded by those chunin floated through her mind. 'I swear on this pain in my left hand I'm not going to need to be saved again… I'm not going to get afraid and run away! I won't lose to Sasuke!'

Gritting her teeth she pushed herself to her knees, her hand came up to rest of her forehead and found no headband there. Searching with her eyes they finally fell upon it, the headband that meant so much to her lied underneath the shoe of Zabuza.

'Sensei! Can I borrow your leaf headband?'

'Oh this? No, no, this is a symbol that you have graduated and grown up!' Memories flashed faster across her vision, as her hands began to clench in anger.

'Naruko,' a beat up and tired Iruka said. 'come here. I want to give you something. Congratulations on graduating.' He handed over his own headband to her.

'You guys are all punks who don't deserve to be ninja's, you will be risking your lives on missions,' Kakashi said before the memory flashed to a later one. 'You all pass.'

One final memory resurfaced, one of herself. 'Im not the troublemaking kid you still think I am! I'll surpass the Hokage! And then the whole village will have to acknowledge my existence!'

A determined look sparkled in her blue eyes as she shakily shoved herself to her feet. Her arms hung limp at her side as she waited for the feeling to return to her legs as she stood there. Slowly she lifted her head enough so that her eyes could stare at the Zabuza clone. "I won't run away anymore!" She yelled with determination and strength as she took off for the clone.

Kakashi yelled out in horror telling her to stop. Sasuke and Sakura both had wide eyes not believing what the blonde was doing. "Naruko are you crazy!" Sakura yelled out in fear. Sasuke just stared in surprise not understanding why she'd risk her life. Her plan on fighting him head on didn't go as planned however.

When her foot kicked up to hit Zabuza, he easily deflected it, shoving her foot back and away from him. The force of the counterattack threw her off balance as her foot hit the ground and she waved her arms to try to regain it.

"Idiot," clone Zabuza said as he grabbed her by the neck and shoved her once more away from him. The dirt scrapped across her skin, tearing at her clothes as her half sleeve was ripped off and blood leaked from the gashes on her body. Laying face down on the ground she came to a stop in front of Sasuke and Sakura. For one second she laid there to catch her breath causing Sasuke to wonder if she was even still alive.

"Your such an idiot Naruko!" Sakura yelled as she raised her fist. "Going after him like that! We have no chance against him!" Naruko ignored what Sakura was saying as she pushed herself she was determined to take down this guy. She would no be afraid of him. Would not back down. Standing up slowly she clutched at the thing she had been after when rushing at Zabuza. The blue headband was held tightly in her hand, her head bowed. Blood was dripping from her mouth steadily as she lifted her head to finally look at him.

"Hey put this in your book, the girl who will one day become Hokage of Konoha, Uzumaki Naruko!" She quickly tied her headband back to her forehead instead of its usual place around her neck. Her blue eyes shined bright with determination as she turned to look at Sasuke. "Sasuke, I've got a plan."

"Actually wanting to work together dobe," Sasuke said but was interested in what she had come up with.

"So arrogant for someone so young," Zabuza said with a sneer. He would swat down this annoyance and then deal with the others. Kakashi from his place in the Prison was panicking. His student was trying to go against this demon and did not stand a chance, she would get herself killed.

"What are you doing?" He screamed. "Run away! The fight was over as soon as I was trapped. Our job is to protect Tazuna-san, did you forget!? Get out of here!" Naruko ignored her sensei and instead turned to Tazuna-san, as she kept her eyes on Zabuza.

"What do you think old man?" Naruko asked knowing that in the end it was up to him what they would do. He was after all the client and in a way their boss.

"I started this, I won't now say that I want to live so much that I stop you. I've this fight everything you have." Naruko nodded only needing that approval to go ahead with her plan. A smile slid across her face as her confidence went up.

"Let's do this then," she said as she threw back her pigtails Zabuza glanced at the small girl amused by the girls confidence. Laughter bubbled out from him as his smirk grew.

"Playing at ninjas like it's a child's game, however, by the time I was your age my hands were already died with the color of my enemies blood."

Kakashi wanting his students to understand and then hopefully leave said, "the demon Zabuza." At this Naruko was becoming to feel a little nervous, this man had killed at her age. She had barely even fought anyone. However that didn't matter she had to do something against this enemy.

"Where he comes from in the village hidden in the mist, also known as "the village of the bloody mist", to become a shinobi you had to do the most inhumane difficult test imaginable." Looking surprised Zabuza spoke up.

"I see you've heard about our graduation ceremony." Naruko frowned, what were they talking about? What did Zabuza have to do? Her curiosity and need to know more about her enemy had her speaking up.

"What graduation ceremony?" She asked but her question caused the demon to laugh once more. Irritation flooded her body as she listened. She was tiring of his laughter.

"It was basically a killing spree among classmates," Zabuza finally explained. Naruko's eyes widened in shock and disbelief. Classmates killed each other?

"Students who had been friends, eating from the same dish, were divided into pairs who were forced to fight one another, to the death," Kakashi explained. "Think about it, comrades who trained together, lived together, shared each other's every dreams and hope. Ten years ago the elders of the village had to enact a sweeping reform of their barbaric graduation ritual. Because of me person who made it essential to happen. Without a moment of hesitation, without any hesitancy, a boy who hadn't even qualified yet to be a ninja, butchered over a hundred members of that years graduating class."

"Ah, I use to have such fun," Zabuza said gloating. Naruko tensed lifting her bandaged hand to cover her face on instinct when Zabuza disappeared. He was coming for them, it was just a matter of who he hit first.

She spun around when Sasuke suddenly disappeared from her side and Zabuza was there instead forcing him down on the ground with a hit to the stomach. Sasuke grunted as blood spit from his mouth and the demons foot landed on his chest keeping him to the floor.

"Time to die," he said. Naruko stared at Sasukes body before turning her gaze to Zabuza. A snarl covered her lips, he had attacked another comrade and she was beginning to get tired of being thrown around. It was time in her opinion to get this over with.

"Shadow clone Jutsu!" She yelled as a hundred of her look alikes popped up around her. Her and her clones grabbed kunais and charged. She hoped to overwhelm him with how many there was, and get a hit in at least. This was probably the last thing they could do that would work. Quickly she went through the hand motions and her true self disappeared turning into a shuriken, her clone quickly caught her and yelled out, "Sasuke!" Sasuke spun around and caught the shuriken coming his way.

He glanced down at it and nodded, understanding her plan and knowing it was a good one. Facing the real Zabuza, Sasuke glared at him, holding up the Shuriken so it faced his target. "Demon wind shuriken! Windmill of shadows!" Jumping into the air he threw the shuriken, releasing it through the air, it spun violently toward Zabuza.

Zabuza shook his head knowing that shuriken would do nothing against him. It was far to easy, child's play. It wouldn't touch him he was sure of it. As the shuriken flew through the air the clone and real demon were both surprised when it flew past the clone, not even trying to touch him, instead flying at the real one. Smirking he caught it easy as he said, "at least this time you tried for my real form. That is a step up."

Easily his hand caught the shuriken but his eyes widened when out of the shadows of the first a second one appeared. He could feel the panic for only a second before jumping up into the air so the shuriken missed him but just barely. "Still not enough."

"He dodged it!" Sakura yelped moving closer to Tazuna. Sasuke smirked but didn't say anything to give away the surprise. With a puff of smoke Naruko appeared flying through the air where the shuriken once was. Twisting around her hand reached for a kunais from her weapon pouch.

"Here goes nothing," she said to herself as she released the kunai, aiming it at the hand that was connected to the Prison Kakashi was trapped in. Zabuza sensing something was coming away glanced over his shoulder and noticed Naruko and the kunai coming his way. His eyes widened in shock but it was too late to try to grab the kunai with his hand that held the shuriken. He did the only thing he could. Letting go of the Jutsu he jumped out of the way.

Anger filled him that someone so small and inexperienced could get one over him. The idiot actually almost hit him. Pulling back the shuriken in his rage he was ready to end the girl. He would kill her now, she had lived long enough.

Naruko widened her eyes as she landed on the grass across from the demon. She knew he was going to kill her there was no way she had the skills to stop him, she had gotten lucky with almost hitting him. Kakashi faster than she was able to see blocked the shuriken that he was going to fling at her with the medal plate on his ninja gloves. A relieved look fell across her face as she watched her sensei.

"Kakashi-sensei!" Sakura yelled out in happiness.

"Naruko your plan was amazing," Kakashi said. "You have all matured. Just so you know the same jutsu won't work twice. Your move." Zabuza began to move fast forming another hand sign. In an instant Kakashi's sharingan eye activated and he was copying the jutsu just as fast.

"Water style!" They both yelled. "Water dragon missile!" The water around them seemed to explode as two dragons formed from I'm front of each of them. With a gigantic boom the two water dragons crashed into each other, canceling each other out, as water was thrown away from the two and washing around the team still on the grass. Naruko from the opposite side widened her eyes as water was flung around her soaking her body and her clothes.

She watched as Zabuza and Kakashi met in the middle where the dragons had crashed. Here the two jonins crashed meeting kunai against sword. Pushing against one another they separated sliding across the water and mirroring one another. Each movement Zabuza executed Kakashi easily and quickly mimicked. Zabuza eyes widened, all of his movements, his gestures, it was like he see's-.

"Through them all," Kakashi said causing Zabuza to stiffen.

"Are you reading my mind? Hes-"

"Got that sickeningly evil look in his eye, right?" Kakashi asked.

"Your just a pale imitation."

"You are a pale imitation," Zabuza said.

"I'm the real deal, no copycat stands a chance against me," they both said. Zabhzas eyes widened in shock as anger and frustration ripped through his body.

"You mimic me like a parrot, I'll close your beak for good!"

"Water style!" Kakashi yelled out before Zabuza could finish his hand signs. "Giant waterfall!"

Zabuza couldn't believe that this copycat could beat him to his jutsu before even he was able to finish it. The other jonin was far too fast. A giant rush of water erupted around them trying to push Zabuza away. Naruko held up her arms trying to block the water from hitting her face as she tried to keep track of the fight. Unfortunately most of it was too fast for her eyes or there was too much water blocking them from view.

Zabuza jumped out of the way dodging the rush of water as best he could. It was all he could do to keep from being swept away with the strong current of water trying to crash into him.

"Can you see the future?" Zabuza said.

"I predict your death," Kakashi said. He lifted his kunai ready to once again attack and rid himself of this demon when senbons cut through the air, piecing into the neck of the demon of the mist. His eyes widened at the sharp pain before they closed and he began to fall forward. A masked person came out of nowhere to catch his body before taking it to shore. Setting down the body the stranger glanced up at Kakashi.

"Your prediction came true."


	5. Wave Mission Part 3: Training

**A Path Rewritten**

 **Chapter Five**

 **Training**

 **Sorry this has taken me so long. But here it is! I think one more chapter before this wave mission is over.**

Naruko stared at the stranger who stood over Zabuza's apparently now dead body. She couldn't tell if the stranger was a he or she. The clothes were baggy and unisex. The mask that covered the stranger face gave away no information as well. The mask held four marks on the forward and eye holes, then where the mouth should have been there were two curving lines, the longer one more of a swirl.

Kakashi appeared next to the body in a puff of smoke so that he could check whether or not he was dead, and the stranger was telling the truth. Reaching out he touched the side of his neck looking for a pulse.

"He is dead."

"I appreciate your help," the stranger said. Naruko noticed that even their voice didn't seem to show the gender. They were a mystery. "I hope you don't mind that I interfered, I just wanted to be the one to kill him myself."

"Your mask it's familiar," Kakashi said drawing the attention of the stranger. "Are you a shinobi hunter from the village Hidden in the Mist?" Naruko frowned having remembered from class that Iruka had briefly talked about them.

"Impressive," the hunter-nin said. "That is correct. My duty is to hunt down missing-nin."

"Now is that even possible!" Naruko asked her eyes staring at the kid who had to be about her age. "That kid isn't much older than me! How could he have beat em. Someone that powerful."

"I'm sorry Naruko," Kakashi said staring down at his student. "I understand what your feeling." Kakashi reached down and messed up her hair causing the girl to glare a bit. "There are some kids out there even younger than you, that are stronger than me." The hunter-nin crouched down by Zabuzas body and grabbed a hold of it.

"Your battle is over, now I must get rid of his body. It holds many secrets. Farewell." With those departing words the hunter and the now deceased Zabuzas disappeared in a gust of leaves. Naruko stared where they once were before turning to Kakashi. She watched as he pulled back down his headband once more to cover the red eye.

"We must get Tazuna back home now," Kakashi said but Naruko noticed he was looking a little weak and weird. Having been studying him so intently she noticed when his one eye rolled into the back of his head and he passed out, heading for the ground. She jumped forward and caught his overly heavy body. She wasn't able to completely stop the falling of his body because he was so much bigger than her but she was able to slow the descent.

"Come," Tazuna said glancing down at the unconscious ninja. "Let's get him to my house."

Sasuke quickly went to Naruko's side grabbing one arm of Kakashi, swinging it up and around his shoulders so he could help Naruko carry him. Naruko did the same and they began to drag Kakashi after Tazuna.

"We are only an hour away from my village," Tazuna said. "There my daughter can help us get your sensei back to full health."

 **~3~**

Naruko stared at Kakashi as he told them that Zabuzas was still alive and not dead. She couldn't believe after everything that happened he was still alive. "Whether or not Zabuzas is even alive I'm sure Gatou will send someone even worse after us. We need to prepare before it's too late."

Sakura spoke up from her spot on the floor closest to Kakashi. She was staring at him incredulously. "Sensei what do you mean prepare? You can hardly move."

"You will receive training," Kakashi said.

"Sensei not to be rude but what's training going to do for us when you were barely able to go against him even with the Sharingan." Kakashi stared at Sakura with tired eyes but there was a hint of amusement in the depth of blackness.

"Sakura, you three were the ones to save me when I was struggling, you have all grown so much. Especially you Naruko, you have grown the most!" He sent an eye smile at the blonde girl. Narukos eyes widened as a smile spread across her face at those words. Sakura still looked confused and doubtful as she questioned Kakashi again.

"If Zabuzas is alive should we really be training?" She asked. "He could attack at any moment."

"He was put in a temporary death, it would take his body a little while before healing. Until then we train."

"We can do this," Naruko said smiling. The smile however fell when the door opened and a small boy entered the room.

"No you can't," he said with a frown on his face as he stared at Naruko. Naruko frown deepened at the boys words, a scowl crossing over her face at his lack of belief in them.

"Who're you kid?" Naruko asked skewering him with her eyes.

"This is my grandson, Inari," Tazuna said motioning for his grandson to move more into the room.

"There's no way you guys can go against Gatou." Naruko frowned deepened before she jumped up and pointed her finger at the small boy, a determined smile crossing her face.

"I'm going to become an amazing shinobi called the Hokage! Whoever this Gatou guy is better watch out. I'll be a hero!" Sasuke and Sakura both shook their heads at their team mate. Her excitement was sometimes a little over the top.

"There's no such thing as a hero," Inari said causing Naruko to freeze and stare at him. "If you want to live, you'd leave." He then turned around to leave, his grandfather tried stopping him but the boy didn't listen. Naruko stood to leave ignoring the looks the others gave her as she ran after the boy, wanting to convince him that he was wrong, there were heroes. However when she finally found him it was to the sniffling of the small boy as he cried. One word could be heard over his sobs that caused Naruko to turn around and leave.

"Dad." This she felt was more than just about Gatou and couldn't bring herself to go comfort the boy. It was obvious the boys dad probably died by Gatous hand or actions and she wasn't sure how to go by making him feel better. The pain of a lost father was a touchy subject even she knew that. Quietly she shut the door and walked back downstairs not saying anything as she followed the others outside, ready to start the training.

 **~3~**

Naruko glanced down at the kunais that Kakashi-sensei had thrown at their feet. Leaning over she picked hers up and glanced over at the tree closest to her. Surely the concept of using her Chakra to climb the tree wouldn't be too hard. Closing her eyes she centered herself before calling up her Chakra and then centering some of it on the soles of her feet. Determining that she was ready to try this exercise she began to run at the tree as instructed, just before reaching it she jumped soaring through the air landing on the tree.

For just one second she could feel her foot grip onto the tree before the rest of her weight caught up to her and the Chakra couldn't hold her, she came crashing to the ground. It was obvious she hadn't put enough Chakra into her feet. As the pain cleared from her head she stay laying on the ground, rolling her head to the side to see how the other two did.

The tree next to hers had a huge footprint in it, and a few feet away stood Sasuke. He too had failed, but only used too much chakra. Moving her eyes some more she found Sakura, only not where she expected her. The pink haired girl was up in a tree sitting on a tree branch. Naruko blanched her eyes widening

Sakura was better at this than her! She couldn't believe she had less control than her. Rolling onto her stomach she saw the same expression in Sasuke's eyes as he stared at the other female.

"Now we know who has the best Chakra control in the group," Kakashi said making Sakura panic as she glanced down at Sasuke. "Looks like she will become Hokage rather than you Naruko, and the finest hope of the Uchiha doesn't seem very impressive either."

"Kakashi-sensei! Please shut up!" Her panicked gaze found the Uchiha again. He would hate her. Kakashi watched over them knowing the other two could catch up easily, their Chakra reserves were far more vast that Sakura's was nothing in comparison. Standing to her feet Naruko dusted off her shorts frowning before settling her eyes determinedly at Sasuke. She could pass him at least.

With a new found determination she once again put Chakra to her feet and ran at the tree.

Hours later Naruko could feel herself begin to grow tired and she hadn't made very much progress toward her goal. She had only been able to stick to the tree for half a step before calling back down again. Sighing she picked herself up off the ground before rubbing at the back of her head, that had been hit pretty often on her falls. As she rubbed her head she glanced around the forest and her eyes laid upon Sakura who no longer was training as she has already gotten the hang of it.

With a sigh of defeat she decided to go and ask the other girl how she had done it. Sakura may not be her most favorite person but she was her teammate and understood what was going on. Naruko could suck up her pride to go ask the pinkette for help.

Using her Chakra to push her faster over to the other girl, she sat down folding her legs beneath, beside Sakura and gave a sheepish grin. Sakura hated her as well it's possible she wouldn't even tell her.

"Sakura-chan," Naruko said in her best sweet voice. "Could you possibly help me figure this out? I can't figure out why I can't put out the right amount of Chakra." Her voice was irritated by the end of her sentence. Kakashi who was watching the exchange smiled under his mask. Naruko had untapped potential that would be great, he hoped this exercise would be a step into tapping into it.

Later that day Sakura had been sent to watch Tazuna at the bridge, and Kakashi left the dark haired boy and blonde girl to train by themselves, while he headed back to the house to heal and rest. Naruko pushed herself to the limit and drove herself even past that. She had to get this, had to prove that she was just as good as Sasuke, maybe even better.

Wiping at the dirt on her face she glanced up at where Sasuke was still making more progress than her before jumping back down. Frowning she gritted her teeth in irritation before thinking back on what Sakura had said. She was even jealous of the links the being able to figure it out faster than them. Even understanding the concept that the other girl had said didn't make it any easier executing it.

Closing her eyes she began to center herself but before she could get a handle of her Chairs she felt someone staring at her. Opening her eyes she raised an eyebrow up at Sasuke. "Why are you staring? I can't concentrate." Sasuke scowls, his eyes glared at her but his mouth opened to talk.

"What did Sakura tell you when you asked for her help?" Sasuke asked a displeased look on his face at having to even ask.

Naruko smirked at him as she wiped at her face once more. "Asking me for help Sasuke. Should have asked her yourself." With those words she made a run for the tree again, this time making it farther than before.

 **~3~**

Naruko sighed having dragged her tired body into a seat next to Kakashi-sensei at the dining room table. Her stomach rumbled with hunger as she stared down at the food that had been prepared for them, this evening. After a full day of training and hardly any time to stop and eat for anything, she still felt the need to be outside but knew when to eat and replenish her strength. If she exhausted her Chakra too much she would be useless when it was time to fight. That's something she wanted to do the opposite of.

Even though she felt like her stomach would be ripped into two she still took her time to calmly eat so she looked like a girl with some manners. Her eyes kept drifting over to where Sasuke sat across from her, she remembered the need to beat him, to prove she could be just as good or better than him.

He was scarfing down his food no doubt trying to hurry to get back outside to train. She frowned not wanting to be out done by him but not wanting to be rude either. She began to eat a little faster while still managing to hold her manners. Sakura stared at the two of them with a sigh not understanding their new competitive nature.

It caused a bout of jealousy inside of her. Naruko was able to have some kind of relationship with Sasuke, even if it wasn't the greatest, but he still acknowledged her. Sighing she slowly ate at her food trying to ignore the growing jealousy at her new teammate. They were never close, usually fought, but she wanted to at least try.

As Naruko took her last bite Sakura had stood up and walked over to a photo that seemed to have been tampered with. Someone had been ripped out from it, and it caused her curiosity to be spiked. She lightly touched the photo before withdrawing her hand and clasped them behind her.

"Was this picture purposefully ripped out?" she asked turning to look at Tazuna. However, it wasn't the old man that answered, instead it was his daughter who had been washing dishes. Her grip tightened on the plate as her eyes began to water.

"That picture had Inari's father in it." Tazuna walked up to his daughter and rested a hand on her shoulder. His voice was heavy with emotion when he spoke up.

"Our city once called him a hero," Tazuna said his voice aging many years. Naruko glanced over at Inari as his body began to shake, whether it was in anger or sadness she couldn't tell, but she figured it was a mixture of both. She could see his eyes clouded with emotion as he raced out of the room slamming the door behind him.

Tsunami glared at her father, anger shining bright in her eyes. "Father! I've told you to never speak of that in front of my son!" Naruko watched as Tazuna explained who the man was and what exactly happened to him, telling them why his daughter and grandson were so distraught. Her heart tightened with every word. They had lost someone to that man, someone they cared about, just because he believed in doing what was right.

Her determination became stronger as the story went on. She had to show that Inari was wrong, to show him that Heroes still existed. Standing up she could feel her legs try to buckle from underneath her but she forced them to lock, then to take a step, then another. They shook and she could feel the exhaustion from training so much today, but she had to get better, to master that new way of using Chakra. It was one step closer to showing Inari.

Kakashi noticed her exhausted state, his eye following her in worry. Her foot caught on the carpet causing her to stumble but before she could fall Sasuke was there holding her up.

"What are you doing dobe?" he asked as he straightened her before quickly letting go so he could sit back down.

"Naruko you should go rest before training," Kakashi said having stood to his feet when she stumbled. His surprise at Sasuke helping her stopped him in his tracks from catching her himself. "You could get yourself hurt, or worse."

Naruko righted herself glaring lightly at Sasuke. "I'm going to prove to Inari."

"To prove what?" Sakura asked in confusion. Even she looked a little worried at her teammate.

"To show him that there are still heroes in this world." With a determined look on her face she left the house going back into the woods. She traveled to the training spot they had used earlier in the day. Now that she had a full stomach she felt like she could go longer without dropping from exhaustion. It was easy to push back her tired state and just focus on the motions of pulling her Chakra to her feet and then running at the tree.

Little by little she grew closer to the top, but it was never enough. She still wasn't there. As the hours flew by she could feel herself grew weaker and weaker, she was just so tired. From behind her she heard the shuffling of leaves and a stick cracking, announcing the arrival of someone. Naruko spun around her feet tripping over each other in her tired state.

A hand shot out to steady her for the second time that night. "What are you doing out here Teme," the person said as he quickly let go. "Training right now is stupid, even for you."

"Why do you even care, bastard." She huffed straightening up her clothes from where he grabbed them to stop her fall. Now irritated at the interruption she began to walk back over to the tree, her tiredness from before shoved to the back of her mind.

"I don't," he huffed as he watched her retreating form. "Was just curious to see if you had fallen from exhaustion already." Her face grew red from anger as she swung back around to face him.

"Shut up!" Her fingers clenched at her sides as she glared at him. "Just go away, I'm going to get stronger, and I won't pass out!"

"Hn," he said his bored gaze never leaving her.

"Just get out of here bastard," she hissed out before going back to trying to climb the tree. Sasuke watched her for a few short moments more before disappearing. If she wanted to die from chakra exhaustion he wouldn't stand in her way. She watched him leave out of the corner of her eyes but kept training.

 **~3~**

Naruko groaned as she opened her eyes against the piercing light of the sun. The annoying tapping that originally woke her up happened once more causing her to growl out in irritation.

"You could catch a cold sleeping out here like that," came a girlish voice. She blinked forcing her eyes to focus on the new figure crouching next to her.

"What!" she sat up quickly hating that this stranger was able to sneak up on her. What if she had been an enemy. Glaring at the girl she shoved her away. "Who are you?"

"It doesn't matter, I was only out here picking herbs when I saw you. I didn't want you to grow sick, so I can to wake you." Naruko frowned but couldn't help but feel foolish at being angry with the girl. Rubbing at the back of her head she grinned sheepishly.

"Sorry, thanks for waking me."

"That's fine, would you like to help me pick herbs?" Frowning Naruko thought it weird that she would ask but it was the least she could do after being rude.

"What were you doing out here?"

"I was training," Naruko said as she picked the herbs that the stranger had pointed out to her.

"That would make sense," the stranger said. "Your headband announces that you are some kind of ninja, right?"

"Yeah it does," Naruko said as she reached up to touch her headband.

"What are you training for anyway?" the stranger asked as she continued to pick herbs.

"To get stronger so I can become the head ninja of my village and then everyone would have to acknowledge me for who I am. And at the moment I'm proving my strength to a person that I know."

"Is this training for the sake of that person or your own satisfaction?" she asked with a small giggle. Naruko frowned at her question and the fact that she giggled after it.

"What do you find funny?" Naruko huffed glaring lightly at the girl.

"Do you have anyone special in your life?"

"What do you mean special?" she asked no longer angry just confused as she moved closer to the girl.

"When someone is protecting something truly precious to them, they can truly become as strong as they must be!" A small smile crossed her features as she thought of her own special person. Naruko glanced down at the blade of grass she was shredding in her hand as memories of important people flashed across her mind's eye.

 _Kakashi sensei turned back to look at Sasuke during the battle with Zabuza. "I will never let my comrades die."_

 _"_ _Daddy loves the village where his little boy lives."_

 _Naruko held the scroll as she glared darkly over at Mizuki. "Keep away from Iruka-sensei, or I'll kill you," she said dangerously._

Naruko smiled softly as she realized she did know what that felt right, she did have special people now. "Yes, I do believe I know that feeling." The stranger smiled kindly before her eyes slid over to behind the blonde-haired girl. Her expression becoming tighter before focusing back on Naruko.

"I believe you will get stronger, and I'm sure we will meet again, soon," the stranger stood to their feet and began to walk away. "Thank you for helping me. And when we meet again I think you should know that I am a boy." Naruko stared in disbelief at his retreating back. She couldn't believe that was a boy, he looked even more girly than Sakura or even herself. He had been so beautiful that now knowing it was a boy she blushed as she shook her head.

"Who was that?" Sasuke asked as he walked up to Naruko still glancing behind him at the stranger.

"Just some person I met," Naruko said turning her attention to her teammate. "Why do you care bastard?"

"I don't," he said before walking away two a couple trees' over to train himself. Naruko frowned as she watched him. He had become to be around more often as she trained, and she found it annoying. However, it did seem to drive her to work harder as she tried to surpass his own training. But as the days went by she found herself growing use to his presence, and no longer wondered why he couldn't go find his own piece of forest. Instead it became a routine that she no longer felt the need to break up. It wasn't like he didn't find her anyway.

A part of her wondered if he only did it to make sure she wasn't talking to strangers in the woods anymore. Kakashi-sensei probably put him up to it.

On the seventh day of their training Naruko felt triumphant as she hugged a tree branch huffing and puffing at the effort it took. But she had finally done it! She was almost to the top of the tree. Just a little farther and she would be there, even if it did take a lot of effort to get that far.

"Sasuke even disappeared this morning as well," she could hear Sakura say from below herself. She watched them from her perch in the tree wondering how long it would take them to realize that one of the people they were looking for was right above them. Breaking a piece of the tree branch off she then allowed it to drop landing between her sensei and teammate.

Startled both glanced up in unison their surprised faces landing on Naruko. "Good job Naruko," Kakashi said with pride. "I see you are getting more control."

"Yeah I am!" Naruko said as she stood up a mischievous glint shining in her eyes. "And I'll keep getting better too, datta-." Her foot slipped causing her to lose her grip on the branch. Waving her arms around she tried to regain that balance but wasn't successful as her body began to fall over the side of the limb causing her team mates below to panic. Kakashi couldn't jump up and catch her as his body still wasn't fully recovered so he watched in fear of her falling at that great of a height. Sakura covered her eyes not wanting to witness her team mate's death, or at least great injury.

A laugh caught their attention as Naruko only slide around the tree her feet still chakra filled holding her to the limb. "You guys totally fell for it!" She yelled out in happiness. "Should have seen your faces." Wiping away the tears of mirth from her eyes she could only laugh harder when their faces turned to anger at her prank.

"You could have been really hurt, Naruko!" Sakura yelled as she raised her fist wishing to hit some common sense in the other girl.

"She is right Naruko, you should be careful," Kakashi said with a shake of his head.

"Oh, come on guys!" she yelled still laughing. "It was funn-." Her eyes widened as she felt her Chakra slip coming to the end of her hold on it. A gasp slipped from her mouth as she felt herself begin to fall after a moment of being suspended midair.

"That's not funny Naruko!" she heard Sakura yell in anger at thinking it was another joke. She could hear Kakashi gasp knowing that it wasn't. Her heart dropped as she wondered how she would get out of this one. Before her mind could come up with an escape plan she felt something wrap around ankle effectively stopping her decent toward the hard ground. Her breathing was raged as she tried to calm her racing heart as her eyes moved up to see what had stopped her fall.

Before her eyes could travel all the way Sakura yelled out her saviors' name. "Sasuke! Saving the day again!" Naruko let out a sigh as she kept dangling, of course it would be Sasuke.

"What were you thinking?" he asked as he glared down at her.

"Hm," she said looking away from Sasuke before she began to swing her body back and forth. The grip on her ankle tightened to keep her from slipping from his grip.

"What are you doing, if you keep that up I won't be able to hold on to you."

"That's the point," Naruko said before Sasuke's fingers slipped from her ankle and Naruko was able to fall toward the tree, where she used chakra to stick her hand to it. She wrapped her whole body around it hugging it tightly, so she could catch her breath.

"Teme," Sasuke muttered under his breath while he glared down at the blonde-haired girl. Once she felt calm she pushed herself from the tree and pushed herself from each trunk using Chakra before landing on the ground.

"That was very irresponsible, Naruko," Kakashi said with a shake of his head.

"I didn't realize how close I was to losing control," Naruko said with a frown. "I had been doing so well. I just need to practice more." Glancing up at the tree she glared at them. She had to get better at this, it would prove that she was strong. She needed to get to the top, and to never lose control again. Before Kakashi could warn her against that she was gone, jumping up into the trees to find the tallest one. He sighed staring after her knowing he was in no condition to follow.

"I'll go with her to make sure she doesn't kill herself," Sasuke said with a huff as he followed at a slower pace. When he arrived, she was already at it and once she saw him she began to try even harder. They both pushed themselves trying to outdo the other. They went higher and higher becoming more and more exhausted as they pushed themselves past their breaking points.

Sweat dripped down Naruko's face as she rested on a tree branch, brushing at her face. Her eyes trailed over to where Sasuke had been resting as well. She could see him breathing heavily just like her. Pushing herself up from a laying position she climbed to her feet. She was almost there, the top of the tree was just a bit farther away. Jumping back down to the base of the tree she ran using her chakra to begin to climb.

Out of the corner of her eye she could see a black blur racing up another tree alongside of her. Focusing on her chakra she pushed herself faster but in the end they both reached the very top at the same time. Both huffed as smiles covered their faces. They had done it, they reached the top.

"Look Sasuke!" Naruko said with a laugh, forgetting about their competition in the happiness of finally achieving her goal. "We did it." He glanced over to her seeing the same exhausted state reflected in her that he was feeling. A small smile barely graced his lips as he stared at her.

"Hn."

"Yeah, bastard, good job to you too." They both jumped down from the tree meeting at their respective places at the base. Neither one could barely hold themselves up having used so much of their chakra and strength to do this. Especially Naruko who hadn't even left the forest in days. She began to walk forward but stumbled slightly.

Sasuke sighed dragging his tired form over to where she stood and wrapped an arm around her waist. "Come on," he said. "Let's get back to Tazuna's house." Her eyes drifted to her left surprised by his actions but accepting the help he offered. She wrapped her own arm around his waist as well using both of their strengths to drag themselves back to the house they were staying at.

The loud banging of the door opening caused everyone's eyes to instantly land on the duo that had returned.

"We made it to the top," Naruko said with a smile pushing herself from Sasuke. Sakura stared at how close they had been but pushed that from her mind.

"Great job," Kakashi said. "Tomorrow you can start to protect Tazuna at the bridge alongside Sakura."

"Right," they said in unison before going to rest.

 **~3~**

For the next several days Naruko would train until she couldn't move before dragging herself or even Sasuke dragging her back to the house.

She didn't understand why he would show up to help her back. He never said anything when he did it. He would just wordlessly grab her, and half carry her back. She never thanked him, but she was sure he knew that she was.

One night after Sasuke had dragged her back Kakashi helped him place her at the table so she could try to eat. As she laid half on the table not able to push her head from its surface she could feel someone glaring daggers into the back of her head. Cracking open an eye her attention landed on Inari.

"What's your problem?" she asked now pushing herself from the table.

"Why do you keep doing this?" he yelled. "It doesn't matter what you do, you'll never be strong enough to take Gato, he will kill you."

"I will defeat them, I'm not you!" Naruko hissed out in anger at the child. She couldn't understand why he wouldn't try to believe in them.

"You don't know anything! This isn't your town! You don't know anything about me, you're always clowning around and having fun. You don't know a thing about suffering or loneliness, or anything about me."

"So, you think it's ok to go around treating everyone around you like their guests at your pity party. It takes a big man to sit around and cry, you big cry baby!" Her anger had gotten out of control, she wasn't able to keep it in check, not with how exhausted she had been. Guilt clouded her features as Inari began to cry before running out of the dining room.

"You went too far, Naruko," Sakura said with a glare. Naruko stood up from her spot her eyes glaring daggers at the Pinkett. Did she not think she knew that already? She hadn't meant for her anger to get out of control, it just slipped. Without another word she left to go to where her bed laid. She was done.

Kakashi sighed as he stood up after watching his student leave in anger. Instead of going to comfort Naruko, whom he knew would never except it in this state, he instead went for Inari. He had to tell the boy that Naruko understood him much better than he realized. He only hoped the kid understood and that helped him be a little understanding toward the blonde.

 **~3~**

Walking down to the pier he could see the small body of the boy. "May I join you?" Kakashi asked but did not wait for a reply before sitting. Inari refused to say anything as the older man settled next to him. "I hope you will forgive Naruko, she didn't mean to be rude. She just sometimes lacks the finesse. Your grandfather told us the story of your father." Kakashi paused for a second to see if the boy would respond. When he didn't he decided to go on.

"You know Naruko grew up without a father, just like you. He didn't have either parents, or even a friend growing up, her life was one big painful memory for her. In the short time I've got to know her I've never seen her once cry, or use her troubles to sulk or become a coward.

"She had always tried her hardest, hoping that someone would notice and give her acknowledgement. That is her dream, and she has risked her life for it." Inari glanced at the older man out of the corner of his eyes. "I believe that one day she had given up on crying. She understands what it means to be strong, knows what it means and what it costs, just like your father. Naruko understands and knows you better than all the others."

"What?" Inari asked becoming interested.

"She won't leave you alone now, you've gotten under her skin."

 **~3~**

Naruko woke up groggy her eyes glancing around the small room her team having been staying in. Slowly she realized no one was around and how late it was. Jumping up in surprise she quickly clothed herself racing around the room.

"Naruko, Master Kakashi said for you to take the day off."

"I can't believe they left me! I've got to get going!" As she was running through the forest something caught her eye. Coming to a stop she quickly spun back around racing back the way she had come. When she came to Tazuna's house no one was there but there had been a trace of a fight.

"Inari." Naruko whispered. "Tsunami." Racing off she searched for them. Her eyes widened before turning into glares as she raced toward Inari, grabbing him from his captors and replacing them with a log just as the sword cut through it.

She placed him lightly down by his mother's body making sure that both of them were ok. Then slowly, angrily turned to where the henchmen were. "It's a hero job to be here in the nick of time, you know," Naruko said with a smile. "Good job, Inari."

"Will you be ok Naruko?" Inari asked as he stayed by his mother.

"No problem," she said as she swiftly threw several Shuriken at her enemies. The enemy ninja were easily able to dodge them but it was never meant to hit her targets. Just distract them long enough so that her clones could sneak up on them. Her clones were quickly able to dispatch all the enemy men and she just smiled happily at protecting Inari and his mother.

Naruko became sorrowful as she turned to stare at the smaller boy. "Inari, I believe I owe you an apology. I'm sorry that I called you a baby, you're not one, you're strong." Naruko smiled as she reached forward to mess with his hair in a fond way. The blonde turned to look at the men that her clones had quickly tied up before disappearing.

"If they came here for you two, then the bridge is going to be a target too." Her mind became determined she had to get there but only when she knew Inari would be safe. "You'll be fine here right?"

"Yes!" he said

"Then I'm going to go help them. You take care of your mom." After one last check to make sure there wasn't any more henchmen she quickly ran toward the bridge. Hoping that she wasn't too late.


	6. Wave Mission Part 4: The Ninja Path

**A Path Rewritten**

 **Chapter Six**

 **Wave mission part 4: The Ninja Path**

 **Hi guys! So I'm back with my next chapter! As I have stated in the past this story is going to follow closely to cannon and their will be lots of text from the manga/anime however I do intend to add my own extra content however I loved the wave arc. I thought this was a great growing period for Naruto and the others and they learned how ninja's were in this arc.**

 **I promise there will be more of my own added content in the upcoming chapters. How else will Naruko and Sasuke ever get together in the future!**

 **So enjoy and please review and tell me how you guys are liking it, or even not liking it.**

Naruko ran as fast as she could toward the bridge. She could sense it in the air, there was danger. Her comrades were in danger, she had to get there to help, every second left them in more danger. Pushing herself faster she came to the bridge within minutes. There she stopped, hunching down in the tree's watching what was going on. She could see Kakashi facing off with Zabuza, Sakura with Tazuna, and Sasuke fighting the masked kid. Her eyes narrowed at the ice prison that the two were trapped inside. He sent a barrage of kunai at her teammate leaving Sasuke to try to dodge in vain.

Several weapons sliced across his skin causing him to gasp and fall in on himself. Sakura stepped forward taking a kunai throwing it toward the masked kid trying to keep him from hurting her precious Sasuke more.

Naruko frowned, anger awakened inside of her at seeing her teammate being attacked. Standing up she shot forward the only thing on her mind was to protect one of her precious people. How dare he try to harm one of them. Her hand reached into her weapons pocket quickly grabbing a shuriken from its depths.

Throwing it she watched as the shuriken hit its target, causing the boy to fall to the ground. Naruko jumped down falling in front of the prison her eyes surveying it.

"Ah, the joker," Haku said his eyes resting on the newcomer. The girl from the forest. She seemed more reckless now, not nearly as level headed like then. Naruko's eyes drifted over to where Sasuke was on the ground. Anger began to fill her once more.

"I'm here to help," she said her eyes moving back to the enemy. Naruko sensing an attack coming from behind spins around surprised to see several shuriken making their way toward her. Pulling her Kunai up in defense she readied herself to dodge each one, but it was useless. A figure moved in front of her keeping any of them from landing a hit. Her eyes widened when she noticed it was the masked one.

He had protected her from being hit. She didn't let her guard down as Zabuza gave the boy an astonished look. "Haku? What are you doing?" The masked boy turned to face his master.

"Zabuza, I would like to battle this girl in my own way. Please let me have her." Zabuza gave an amused chuckle as he watched his disciple.

"So, you don't want me to touch the girl, Haku. How naïve of you. You may have the girl." Naruko frowned as she took the opportunity to run over to Sasuke. Entering the ice jutsu she landed next to Sasuke. Quickly turning to him she began to check him over to make sure all of his wounds were superficial. He glared at her as she did this, smacking away her hands, angry that she would have entered the trap area.

"What do you think your doing in here?" Sasuke growled out. "Your now trapped in here as well."

"At least in here I can protect you, teme," Naruko said. "Shut up." Sasuke frowned at her but couldn't comment before Haku returned. Moving to step in front of Naruko, Sasuke did his fire jutsu causing the area around them to fill with flames in hope that it would destroy the ice walls.

Sasuke took his free hand to pull Naruko closer to him so she wouldn't get caught in the flames. The heat was unbearable being this close to them causing her to press against Sasuke but even if she felt the fire was hot, the ice didn't show the same signs. They weren't affected in the least causing Naruko to frown.

"It's not working," Naruko said as Sasuke stopped his jutsu causing her to step back away from him. Realizing how close she had been to him.

"Your pitiful flames will not harm my ice. It is impossible." Haku readied his senbon and threw hundreds at his two assailants. Naruko grunted as she tried to dodge the attack with no avail, she glanced around quickly trying to figure out where they were coming from, but it seemed they came from everywhere at once.

Naruko began to go through the hand signs for her shadow clone Justus. Multiple clones filled the area as everyone began to attack the mirrors. A figure flew past everyone of them, hitting vital organs in each clone causing them to pop, disappearing in a puff of smoke.

"Using the technique of teleportation, I only need the mirrors to perform it. I'm moving so fast that the two of you might as well be standing still." Naruko began to stand up feeling fed up with the way this was going.

"This is it," Naruko said leaning on one knee. "I've had enough. I've got a dream to fulfill. To become Hokage in my village. Everyone that has treated me like dirt will have to say 'she's the number one ninja!'"

As she pulled herself onto her feet Haku's voice filled the area between them. "I- find it difficult to accept the full Shinobi philosophy," he said. "I would prefer that the two of you do not make me kill you both. But if the both of you do, I shall kill my own heart with my own blade, just as the word 'Shinobi' was originally the words 'heart' and 'blade'- and act as a full-fledged shinobi should. This bridge is a nexus of our destinies. And all our dreams and futures balance on the edge of the knife."

"I have my own dreams, as you have yours." Naruko stiffened as she listened to his voice. "Please try not to resent me, but I'm willing to do whatever it takes, to protect the one I care most about, to fight, to kill, or die to fulfill that person's dreams. Doing so is my own dream. To that end, I will become a true Shinobi, and I shall kill you both."

Naruko could hear Sakura yell out to them, edging them on to fight this guy, then Kakashi telling her to shush. She could barely hear the conversation that the others were having but she knew she shouldn't even try. She had her own battle to fight, she needed to pay attention, so she didn't end up messing up.

She had herself and Sasuke to protect. He was already hurt, and if she wasn't careful his wounds could become worse. She hadn't thought before jumping into the ice trap and now she would need to make up for that.

"Sasuke we need to do something," Naruko said her eyes searching the mirrors for their enemy. He was so fast they couldn't even see him. She still wasn't sure how they would beat him. But she wouldn't allow him to get the better of them, they would be the victors in the end.

"Watch your back, I can't protect myself and you too. Watch him, he's already running low on chakra, his attacks are getting weaker. Haven't you seen that?" Naruko nodded as she finally pulled herself to her own feet.

"Yes, I've noticed. But we can't put it past him trying to trick us as well."

"Watch yourself, he's coming," Sasuke said readying his kunai. Naruko barely saw the attack before more Senbon were shooting through the air. She tried to dodge them, or at least block the weapons with her kunai but there were too many.

They sliced threw her skin, imbedding into her body. The pain caused her to fall to the floor, she couldn't avoid every senbon that was aimed at her vital points. A few had hit her causing her body to become numb and it was hard trying to get it to move again.

Naruko could see the attack coming her way, even if it was so fast she almost missed it. Her body wouldn't let her move. Eyes widening, she quickly closed them not wanting to see when the senbon hit her. Her own will to stay awake was fading fast. Her wounds were making it hard for her to concentrate on her surroundings. She could barely feel when someone snatched her up from the ground and both went tumbling forward.

Sasuke went rolling away from the body of the blonde. Leaving her defenseless in her dazed and hurt state. Sasuke watched as Haku glanced over at the small girl before moving through the mirrors traveling toward her. Sasuke's eyes widened at the realization that he was going to attack her.

'I have to get there first, I have to protect her.' He darted forward, putting all his energy into intersecting the attack. He couldn't allow it to hit her.

Naruko groaned slowly coming too. She was able to twitch her fingers and move a little easier than before. Naruko eyes twitched as they opened, she was finding it hard to pay attention to her surroundings until drips of blood falling in front of her caught her attention. Slowly her eyes raised until they landed on the back of a familiar person.

"Sasuke," she groaned worry beginning to cloud her thoughts as she noticed that the blood was coming from him. She glanced over at where Haku was on the ground but Sasuke himself barely looked like he could stay standing. "Did you?"

"You still get in the way, Naruko," Sasuke said his voice sounding weird but she assumed it had to do with the blood lost. Her eyes widened even more at the realization that he had covered her, took the hit for himself instead of letting it hit her. Instantly memories of the two ran through her mind, their first accidental kiss, training to get to the top of the tree, and all the D-rank missions.

"I used to hate you," Sasuke said his voice getting weaker. Naruko frowned pulling herself up to her knees not having enough energy to stand.

"What did I do? Why me?" Naruko said watching as blood kept falling. Concern and anger that he took the hit clouded her mind. "You should have just left it alone. Why save me?"

"I didn't even realize," he said one of his eyes closing, weakness began to fill his body. "My body just moved on its own. Without my consent." Sasuke's body began to fall all strength he had that was holding him up was now gone. Naruko now no longer feeling the effects of the attack on her, shuffled forward catching him in her arms. She gripped his limp body tightly as she begun to feel tears threaten to spill from her eyes.

"I promised myself that I wouldn't die," Sasuke said now staring up at the heavily fogged sky. His eyes were beginning to feel heavy, he knew it wouldn't be long before he couldn't keep them open anymore. He wished that the fog was gone so he could see the sky, to see the sun. Instead he made due with the blondes' hair that was falling over his face. "Not until I killed my older brother, thought the oath would save me…. But…"

Naruko sniffled trying to keep her tears from crying as she cradled his head in her lap. "You're not going to die, Sasuke, don't say that." Her body tensed as it began to shake. From the other side of the trap Haku began to stand up, his own eyes staring over at the dying boy.

"He got one hit in and in doing so sacrificed himself for you, he was truly a shinobi worthy of respect, because in order to protect someone he cared for, put himself in the way of a trap he knew fairly well was one." Haku glanced over at the shaking girl, seeing the tears held in her eyes, that didn't dare break free. Turning away he began to walk back into the mirror ready to finish what he started. "Is this the first time a comrade of yours has died? That is a ninja's path."

Naruko began to shake, no longer in pain, but in anger. She could feel its heat fill her body as she softly laid her now comrades no longer breathing body gently on the floor. Her fingers clenched at her sides as she slowly pushed herself up to her feet.

"Shut up!" she hissed out. "I'm never going to forgive you for this." She could feel the anger begin to change her. Her eyes never left the body of Sasuke. His dead body, he was dead. She could see that clearly. She could feel her canines grow longer, sharpen. Her features became more animalistic, more demonic. Naruko's eyes glowed red with fury, the demon inside making itself known. She turned around training her now glowing eyes on Haku. "I'm going to kill you!"

Swirling red chakra began to appear around her body, filling the small ice prison with its presence. It sucked her in and she let it, allowing it to feel her body with control, but the only consequence is for her to give up complete control. Rock and debris began to be pulled from the ground throwing it around her body. A fox face seemed to appear and swirl amongst the chakra, its teeth bared, a malicious look gracing its eyes.

She could feel her control slip away, but she wanted Haku to feel the pain that the chakra wished to inflict upon him. He deserved it, he had killed Sasuke. Haku's eyes widened from behind his mask as he watched the chakra form.

"Her Chakra, its physical manifesting itself, what is this? What an appalling chakra it is." Her hand began to change, becoming more animalistic. Her wounds began to heal instantly leaving only blood in its wake, proving that they had been there once before. Naruko charged forward no longer caring about tact, just wanting to inflict pain on the person in front of her.

Haku panicked as he watched her attack him, Naruko charging at full speed. Pulling out senbon he threw them aiming at critical points on her body hoping to stop her. Naruko threw up her arm effectively causing her chakra to deflect all of them.

"You-you deflected them all without touching them?" Haku once again attacked this time from up above. Naruko hit the floor breaking the ground before spinning away out of the range of Haku's attack. Gripping at the floor she applied chakra to keep herself from sliding and hitting the mirror. Haku rushed trying to get to the mirror however Naruko reached out wrapping her fingers around his clothing. A growling emitted from her as she yanked him to a stop. His body jerked, the grip on his arm was becoming unbearable.

Her grip tightened until she could hear a snap. That wasn't enough, that pain was only small to what she was feeling. Bringing back her free hand she sent it flying forward connecting with his face.

There was a crunch as the mask broke and Naruko swung him around after grabbing his arm once more. He was thrown threw the glass mirrors breaking the jutsu and allowing them to be free at last. Each mirror cracked shattering around her but in her anger, she barely noticed. Could barely keep conscious on anything but pummeling the boy in front of her.

"Zabuza- sensei I am finished," Haku whispered as he watched Naruko come at him again revealing the face behind the mask. She skids to a stop swinging her arm forward with the momentum of her movements but seconds before bashing his face in she stops. Naruko stared at the face that revealed the kid she had met before.

Her fist just hung in the air mere inches away from her enemies' face but she couldn't bring herself to hit him. "You're that person I met earlier this morning, aren't you," she said not looking the boy in his eyes.

"Why did you stop?" Haku asked not understanding why she had stopped, why she had spared her. "I murdered your friend, your beloved person, and yet you still spare me."

At the mention of Sasuke, Naruko allowed her eyes to trail over to his body where it laid peacefully down on the floor. Regaining her momentum, she struck her fist across the boy's face. Sending him flying down to the ground once more.

"Where did all your power go?" Haku asked from the ground looking up at the blonde. "How can you hope to kill me with the force you put into that blow." Naruko stared down at the ground not able to meet the face of her friend's killer. She couldn't bring herself to kill this person that she had met earlier.

She thought back to their meeting earlier, when Haku had asked if she had anyone special in her life. _I'm willing to do whatever it takes… to protect the one I care about most…. Doing so is my own dream._

"Most people have it wrong," Haku said drawing her from her own inner thoughts. "Showing mercy to an enemy is kindness. They spare their enemy whose life is in their hands, but don't you understand? It's an empty existence, to go on living alone and unloved when defeats already cost you your dream."

Naruko stared at him in anger and confusion not understanding what he was getting at. "What?!"

"Zabuza-sensei has no use for a weak shinobi, you've taken away my reason for living."

Naruko pointed at him accusingly her face set in a frown. "Why waste your devotion on such a creep? He doesn't care about anything other than those who pay him. Is that brow less asshole really that precious to you, a beloved friend. Does he really care about you?" She was yelling in anger and resentment just trying to hurt Haku and to understand why he does the things he did.

"There was a time that I was precious to someone else, to my parents," Haku said with a small smile. He began to explain to her how he lived in a snowy village and how wonderful his parents were. That was until his father found out about his mother having a Kekkei Genkai and then killed her and tried to kill him as well. He explained how those with bloodlines were hunted and killed because of the power they possessed and how he had become alone and unwanted all because of it.

"I accepted that I was alone in the world, unwanted and shunned from those who saw me as dangerous." Naruko widened her eyes as she realized that she had felt the same way all her life. How the villagers shunned her, rejected her, calling her a monster. Too scared to see her for who she really was, instead seeing her for something she had no control over.

Just the container for the nine tails beast that had been sealed inside of her. The same beast that had destroyed their village and killed countless people.

"Didn't you tell me you wanted to become Hokage of your village?" Haku asked. "If you had someone in your life that acknowledged your existence, who even cared for you, wouldn't that person become the most treasured person in your life?" Naruko thought about the person that was that in her life, her mind went straight to Iruka. He had become that person in her life. He had acknowledged her as more than just the monster of Konoha. He had placed her as an equal, someone he cared about. She had then done the same to him.

"Zabuza took me in even though he knew of my special abilities, he didn't hate it, instead he cherished it, he wanted it. I had been so happy. Naruko, please take my life. Take my life now." Naruko just stared at him not sure if he was being serious or not, or if she could take a life. "What are you waiting for?"

"I get that your use to being the toughest person, unbeatable, but that doesn't mean you can just die if you lose!" Naruko yelled at him. "But that's just crazy, your crazy! There's more to life than just fighting, there's more to you, I'm sure your master likes you for more than just that, right?" Even she was unsure if her words were true or not. After seeing how Zabuza was and acted, she really wouldn't put it past the swordsman to only care for the kids abilities, rather than for him at all.

"That day we met in the forest I remember thinking we were the same, surely you can understand. You'll have to bloody your hands and for that I must ask you to forgive me." Determination ran through her veins as she took a attack stance.

"Is that the only way then?" she asked her fingers reaching for her weapons pouch. "You really see no other way?"

"Yes." His voice was steady, there was no backing down in his mind. Confliction troubled her mind as she stared at the boy who was ready for her to end her life. He stood their calmly while she felt nervous, before finally she settled her mind. He was right there was no other way. He was going to have to die by her hands.

"I hope you find your dream," the boy said as he steadied himself. She found herself looking back at Sasuke. He had a dream as well. Now that dream was no longer going to happen.

"If we'd had met some other place, at some other time, I believe we could have been friends," Naruko said as she grabbed her Hitai-ate putting it around her neck.

"Thank you." Taking a breath, she released it, her left hand in a flash reached for a kunai before charging at the sentenced boy. Her hand sliced forward ready to connect with flesh and deal the killing boy but Haku reached out grabbing her hand, keeping the kunai from slicing into his body.

The grip was not one to harm as he held onto her wrist with great care, but firm enough to keep her from pulling out. "I am sorry Naruto, there is a new reason why I cannot die by your hands." In the next instant Haku had disappeared only to reappear in front of Zabuza, taking the intentional hit. Kakashi's electrified hand went straight through Haku's chest, imbedding his fingers into his flesh.

Naruko glanced around in confusion trying to figure out where her opponent went. Slowly the fog began to clear up allowing her to see farther away, and that's when she was able to make out what happened. It seemed Haku had sacrificed his life for his masters. She watched in anger and disgust when Zabuza went to cut through Haku's body to get to Kakashi. However, before he could Kakashi jumped back taking the boys body with him. Once he was at a safe distance away he pulled his fingers from the kid's chest.

"It seems you were able to get away because of Haku already being dead," Zabuza said as he began to steady himself for another attack. Naruko gritted her teeth in irritation and anger. She began to take steps toward them, her anger causing her to not take head of her own safety.

"Naruko!" Kakashi said yelling across the clearing to her. "Stay out of this. Don't come any closer." Kakashi gently placed the body of the now dead Haku gently on the ground. "This is my fight!"

"Naruko your alive!" Sakura yelled out in happiness causing Naruko to flinch. "Where's Sasuke?" She gulped not sure if she could make herself tell Sakura what happened to the person she claimed to love.

She didn't have to say anything, it seemed Sakura knew just by the blonde's silence what had happened. Tazuna decided to go with the girl allowing her to go to Sasuke and find the truth. They ran past Naruko who was still not saying a word. Her tears were burning at her eyes again and she tried to fight it back.

She knew what Sakura would see, his body full of needles, having given his life for Naruko. She listened to her words as she recited the Shinobi rule number five, stating what they already knew, no shinobi should cry, the mission was your only priority. Naruko clutched at her heart refusing to let any tears fall down her face. She had to be strong.

Naruko could hear the fight between Kakashi and Zabuza and knew by just listening that Kakashi was ahead. Then she heard a new sound over the fighting one. Kakashi's words drowned out the new noise causing her to stare at her sensei's fight. He had impaired both arms leaving the ninja not able to use them anymore.

Completely leaving him defenseless. "Zabuza," came a chilling voice full of a sense of power.

"Gatou, what are you doing here? And why are they all here as well?" Naruko allowed her eyes to drift over to the one they called Gatou, and his group of men. She watched as the man began to laugh finding his words humorous.

"There's been a change of plan, surely you should have seen this happening," Gatou said while laughing some more. "You're going to die, demon. I never intended to pay you. Gatou began to explain the reason why he never intended to keep him alive. It was just too much work when he had to betray them to avoid paying them, so he never hired ninjas from top villages. Explaining how ninja were so ready to kill one another off that then he could just have common thugs finish everything else off, it was efficient and inexpensive plan.

"My only mistake was hiring you, calling yourself the demon of Kirigakure is just plain false advertising. Your no demon, more of a baby demon if that." The crowd of men began to yell and cause a ruckus yelling out about taking them down.

Naruko frowned looking at them, hating how they acted. They were going to be a problem, not like they already didn't have one. If they hadn't appeared Kakashi-sensei would have ended this fight and their job could be over, and then she could have mourned her comrade in peace.

Her eyes trailed back down the ground as she once again gritted her teeth, she couldn't be thinking about him right now. They were going to be enough to handle without her thinking about Sasuke to distract her.

"Forgive me Kakashi, but our fight is over. I no longer have any reason to want to kill Tazuna, which settles our differences." Kakashi nodded telling him that he agreed. If Zabuza was no longer going to attack Tazuna they no longer had any dealings with him. He was free to do anything he wanted.

"That reminds me," Gatou said walking over to Haku's dead body. "I've got a score to settle with this one. You crushed my arm until the bones almost broke!" He stared down at the body before using a foot to kick out hitting the body of the boy. Naruko screamed not believing what he just did.

"What the hell are you doing!" she yelled. "That's disrespectful!" She ran forward coming to stand next to Kakashi knowing that there was more than she could fight herself. Instead she knew she could say something to Zabuza. He was the one who should do something.

"Why don't you do something!" she yelled her eyes focusing on him. "He was with you. He was practically your slave. He would have done anything for you."

"Haku is dead. What's the point?" Zabuza voice was cold. Uncaring.

It pissed her off. "You should care! That man is desecrating him! He was your comrade, your partner! He was with you for years!"

Zabuza scoffed at that barely giving the blonde a glance. "Gatou been using me, and I used Haku. Don't you listen girl, a shinobi's life is one of either users, or tools, or both. I didn't value Haku for himself, but for his bloodline, and what his talent could do for me. I apologize for nothing."

Naruko began to grow angry at the demon. He couldn't say that at Haku, not after everything he did for him. "I can't believe you really mean that," Naruko yelled. She pushed away from Kakashi running at Zabuza now. She didn't listen to Kakashi telling her that they no longer had a quarrel with him, but she had her own fault with the guy.

"He's still my enemy!" Naruko said coming to stand next to Zabuza.

"Who's this nuisance!" Gatou said but she ignored him all eyes only for the demon.

"He cared about you!" she yelled. "Really cared." _Do you have any special person in your life?_ "Was devoted!" _When people protect those precious to them really become strong._ "You think that's just nothing, that he was nothing, you don't even feel a thing!" _I find it difficult to embrace the full shinobi philosophy._ "How can you really be that heartless!" _I'm willing to do whatever it takes to fulfil that person's dream… to that end I will become a true shinobi._ "Is that how people get when your powers are as strong as yours are? He gave his life for yours!" _I'm willing to do whatever it takes to fulfill that person's dreams, doing so is my own dream._ "It's too much, too cruel."

Tears finally broke through Naruko. She began to cry for Haku and for Sasuke. Not feeling that it was fair. She couldn't keep them from coming. They fell hot and heavy down her face but when she glanced up Zabuza's own face was covered in tears.

"Blondie," Zabuza said. She could hear the pain in his voice. "You don't need to say anymore. It pained him to fight you, Haku did not fight for just me but for you as well. He was simply too kind. I'm glad I got to face off with you guys in the end. You may be right blondie. We are still human, we can't always be emotionless tools all the time, I've lost. Blondie let me borrow your kunai."

Naruko tried to gain control over her tears as she tossed the kunai over, allowing the demon to take her weapon, trusting that he would not use it to attack them. Zabuza caught it with his mouth now that his arms were no longer useful. He charged at Gatou's men cutting through all of them easily, as Gatou yelled for them to kill him. Blood rained through the air as Zabuza made a path through the men aiming for their leader.

He stopped in front of Gatou staring evilly up at the man. "If you want to go to the same place as your friend… then go alone!" Gatou said his words becoming shaky as he had watched what Zabuza had done to his men.

"I've no intention of going to the same place as Haku," Zabuza said.

"What are you babbling about?" Gatou said shakily.

"I'm taking you with me to hell!" Zabuza yelled. He aimed his kunai slicing through Gatou causing an arc of blood to rain down over them. All his men gave scared looks as Zabuza stood there over their leader's dead body. He spit out the kunai, his body becoming weak.

He fell face first onto the ground, his strength giving out. Naruko couldn't bare the sight anymore. She tried to look away but Kakashi grabbed her shoulder. "Don't look away," Kakashi said his hand gently laid reassuringly on her. "This was the end of a man who lived full out." Naruko nodded in full understanding. Then another noise caught her attention, the shouts of joy from Sakura. Those noises seemed so foreign to Naruko, in a time like this, it just didn't belong.

"Sasuke is alive!" Sakura yelled making her noises finally come to light. Naruko turned around her eyes widening in shock and happiness. Tears threatened her eyes again and she quickly wiped at them. She had cried too much today already.

"I worried since the beginning of the fight but its great that Sasuke made it after all," Kakashi said.

"You guys sure seem at ease," came one of the hired men.

They all began to yell at once about killing their meal tickets and how they would take what they want.

"Don't you have a way to take them down all at once," Naruko asked Kakashi watching as they all began to run at them.

"I can't," Kakashi said. "After using Raikiri, Kuchiyose and Sharigan, I used too much chakra."

They all came to a stop as arrows began to rain through the air. A voice yelled out, one that she recognized quite well.

"If you come any further into our land, you'll face us. You'll die where you stand!" She shook her head as she noticed the small form in front of a big ground of villagers. It seemed they had arrived to protect their land, tired of hiding from their enemies.

"Inari," Tazuna said seeing his grandson and everyone he was able to round up. "Everyone."

"Heroes are supposed to come late!" Inari said repeating Naruko's earlier statement. Naruko smiled widely at the small boy. She quickly went through the hand signs for Kage Bunshin No Jutsu.

"I'll help as well," she said as several versions of herself surrounded the area. Kakashi quickly followed suit forming clones of himself as well. The men became nervous seeing all of the villagers, and the clones of the ninja. They knew that they were outnumbered and out powered. Hightailing it off the bridge and away.

The villagers began to cheer in happiness, they had won. The people who had reigned terror over them was no longer a threat. It was a time of rejoice but not for everyone. Naruko walked over to Zabuza's body along with Kakashi.

"Look like it's over eh, blondie," Zabuza said seeing her appearance first.

"Yes, it seems that way," Kakashi said answering for Naruko. He once again laid his hand on her shoulder. Zabuza turned his head toward Kakashi.

"Kakashi, blondie, I have a favor to ask."

"Yes?" Naruko asked.

"I want," he coughed not able to finish his sentence. "To see his face."

Kakashi once again covered his eye, nodding toward Zabuza. Kakashi leant down to pick up his body so that he could carry him the short distance to the boy's body. Gently he laid him down on the ground, right where he could see him.

"Seems like you got smart huh," Naruko said coming to kneel next to him. "Too bad it's too late." Zabuza ignored the girl just staring at the face of his precious person. The snow began to fall, and he briefly looked up into the sky. 'Is Haku crying. You've always been by my side, I'd like to be at your side as well in the end.'

"If I could I'd like to go to the same place as you," Zabuza said in-between gasps of air. Naruko watched as his hand shakily reached out to caress the boys face.

"He was born in a village where it snows a lot," Naruko said remembering what Haku had said earlier.

"I see," Kakashi said. "He has a spirit as pure and clean as a newly fallen snow."

 **~3~**

It had been several weeks after the win at the bridge. They had taken care of Tazuna staying until the bridge was finished in case that the men ever came back. No one did. It had been a peaceful two weeks. The team went back to the way it was before. Naruko had gone back to training but had Sasuke who wished to fight with her.

They had become quite competitive between each other. The other one trying to get the best over the other. As they placed the last stones on Zabuza and Haku's graves. Naruko gently laid flowers on Haku's grave as she kneeled in front of it.

"Are those two right about ninjas should be?" Sakura asked as she stared down at their graves.

"Ninja's are not supposed to seek their reason to exist, it's important that they exist as a tool for their village, it's the same in Konoha."

"If that's really the true meaning of being a ninja, then I don't like it at all," Naruko said standing up from her kneeling place on the ground.

"Do you really believe that?" Sasuke asked staring at his sensei.

"No, that's why all ninja live our lives with that ideal always bubbling beneath the surface of our minds, always disturbing. Just like Zabuza and that boy."

"I've made up my mind, Dattebayo! I'm going to follow my own nindo! My way of ninja!"

 **~3~**

Tazuna and Inari wished them a farewell. "We're going to miss you guys," Tazuna said.

"Thank you," Kakashi said

"We'll be visiting you guys again one day, Tazuna-Ochan," Naruko said with a smile as she watched Inari begin to cry.

"You better," he said.

"It's ok to cry Inari," Naruko said having gotten close to the boy over the last couple weeks. She was also trying not to cry at saying goodbye.

"I'm not going to cry! But you can cry too Naruko Oneechan!" Naruko quickly turned around as tears spilt from her eyes. As they walked away Naruko could barely make out them naming the bridge. One named after her. The Great Naruko Bridge.

Her tears began to fall even harder at that and Sasuke had to grip her arm tight, leading her away from the side of the bridge as she couldn't walk straight and see because of her tears.

"I got it, Sasuke!" she said pulling her arm from Sasuke's grip. Wiping away at her tears she could see once again. "When we get back home I'm going to have Iruka-nii treat me to ramen to celebrate!"

Sasuke frowned at the mention of their sensei, wondering when they had become close to be using an honorific as brother.

 **~3~**

Naruko ran through the gates of her village happy to be home after weeks of being away. "I'll go give the mission report," Kakashi said dismissing them to go do their own things.

"Do you wanna go eat with me, Sasuke?" Sakura asked gripping his arm tightly. Hearts filling her eyes as she stared up at him.

"No," Sasuke said turning to Naruko. "Do you want to go train?" Naruko's eyes widened at his question and she was about to say yes, that she would like that, but her stomach began to growl. She laughed awkwardly rubbing at the back of her head, causing her pigtails to wave where her hand caused them to go.

"No matter how much I want to kick your butt Sasuke, but I think I'm going to find Iruka-nii and get him to buy me ramen," she said before dropping her hand. "I haven't had ramen in forever! Maybe afterwards Sasuke!" She gave him a thumb up before bouncing away eager to go find her niichan. Her stomach was rumbling louder than before driving her faster.

Sasuke stared after her as she bounded off, her long blonde hair flowing in the wind behind her. "Hn," he said before walking off in the opposite direction. Sakura's eyes widened as he shrugged off her hand.

"Sasuke!" she yelled out. "I can train with you." He only stopped for a moment before continuing to walk away not even saying another word.

Naruko oblivious to her teammates pain kept running through the village until she came to Iruka's apartment door. She reached out to knock on his door eagerly knowing that he had to be home. She could sense his chakra on the other side. Eventually Iruka opened the door, his eyes holding sleep as he rubbed at them.

Naruko forgot how early in the morning it was that they had arrived, but she couldn't find it in herself to be guilty. She had missed him and the ramen.

"Naruko," Iruka said blinking in surprise. "You got back?"

"Yep!" Naruko said as she began to bounce. "And I've come to eat ramen, but I need your help with that, niichan." Rubbing at the back of her head she gave him a small smile.

"Yeah, give me a moment," he said giving her a smile. "I'll go get dressed and I'll take you out to breakfast." He ruffled her hair playfully causing her to growl and push away his hand.

"Go on and get ready," she said pushing him back into his apartment. "I can't wait forever, I'm starving!" Iruka laughed as he disappeared and then reappeared only a few minutes later.

"You should really eat something more nutritional for breakfast, Naru," he said as they walked through the village.

"You know it's my favorite. I can live just fine off it." He sighed but allowed it to drop knowing it was a losing battle.

"Tell me about your mission," he said moving to another topic. "You were gone quite a while." He pushed aside the drapes of the ramen stand allowing her to move forward ahead of him. She quickly sat down.

"Eh, Naruko!" Teuchi said with a smile. "It's been a while since you've been here."

"I've been gone on a mission but I'm back now and would love a bowl of your miso ramen!"

"Coming right up," he said with a laugh. "And for you?"

"Just beef, please." Turning back to Naruko he waited for her to begin her tale.

"The mission was awesome!" Naruko then began to tell him about how their mission went from C to and A rank mission. She explained everything in detail especially about the sad tale of Zabuza and Haku. Iruka was very concerned about Naruko but upon not noticing any damage on her decided to let it be. She was safe, that was all that mattered.

Naruko smiled as she watched Iruka between bites of ramen. Haku had been right, she did have a special person, someone she would do anything for, but now it seemed her list had three others added to it, and that thought made her smile.


	7. New Faces

**A Path Rewritten**

 **Chapter Seven**

 **New Faces**

 **Hey guys here's the next chapter! I believe that I'll be updating more often for a while. I'm no longer working just staying home with my daughter since we've moved. I don't have anyone here that can watch her so for the time being I'm being a stay at home mom. Which means I can stay up late after she goes to sleep at night and write! I no longer have to get up at 430 in the morning to work so that's going to help out a lot! :D**

 **I hope you enjoy this chapter. I've added a lot of my own content into it, and have some relationship building in this one. Leave me a review about how you liked it!**

Naruko had become irritated with the way things were going. After their last mission taking a dangerous turn, they had been downgraded back to mere D-rank missions. It was boring, hardly keeping her attention and she was at her wits end.

As she was walking through the village having just got done training with her team she sensed a presence appear quickly behind her. Turning around she waited for an attack, even though she was a shinobi now it didn't mean everyone had happily went with it. On occasion she got the random attack from villagers and other shinobi alike, but she just dealt with it. There was nothing for them to do.

"Lord third requests your presence, Naruko," a cat masked man said. It was covered in green, with red intricate markings. This mask she knew well, it was one of the few who never treated her differently, he had become the one Hokage-sama would send out to get Naruko. In the past when she had Anbu guards he had been one she saw quite often, she trusted him.

"Hai, kitty-san," she said with a giggle knowing that he hated when she called him that. It had become a nickname she came up with when she was four, but it never faded away. Especially when she got older and realized it irritated him so much. "I will go there right away."

"Mah, Naruko, can't you stop calling me that," he sighed as he glared down at her. Instead of answering she just gave him a cute smile before walking away figuring she should get the meeting with the Hokage out of the way before going home and showering.

"Bye, thank you for the message!" She quickly bounded away wanting to get this over with, so she could go home and rest. Sasuke and herself had gone all out during training and she was finding herself tired. She traveled by rooftop to get their faster, not having to worry about running into any up here.

As she entered the Hokage tower by window Hiruzen glanced up with a shake of his head. "You are becoming like your sensei, Kakashi," he stated as she stood in front of him.

"It was easier this way, Jiji," she said with a twinkling eye look. "What did you need me for? And thank you for sending Kitty-san instead of anyone else."

"I know he is your favorite," he said with a smile. "I brought you here because I have a letter I was supposed to give you when you became a shinobi. However, I had to make sure it was really from who had written it and not an imposture. Here it is." He was unsure about giving it to her as it did make her parentage known to the girl, but he figured the girl had been in the dark about too many things already. And it didn't matter, it was only from the girl's mother and wouldn't give away who her father was.

It was safe enough. Not many knew who Minato had married.

She slowly reached out for the letter wondering who it had come from. A letter had never been mentioned to her before.

"Who is it from?" she asked as she stared down at it.

"Your mother." Naruko froze, her fingers tightened around the letter. This was from her mother. She had written this, held this herself. Her hands began to shake as tears formed in her eyes. "Should I get Iruka?"

The Hokage had noticed her control begin to break. He thought maybe she would need someone she trusted. This would be a heartbreaking moment for her.

"No, I am fine reading it alone," she said. "I prefer it this way. Thank you Hokage-sama, but I would like to go home and read this."

"That is fine, please though if you need someone find them." She nodded before turning to exit using the door this time. She made her way to her apartment in a daze, not noticing who she passed or how she even got there.

She didn't even notice the ANBU who trailed along behind her. The same one from before having been sent to make sure no one messed with her on her way home.

 _"I worry about her," Hiruzen said as he stared at the cat masked ANBU. "She left here in a daze, follow her and make sure she isn't being hassled. Make sure she makes it home safely."_

 _"Hai, Hokage-sama," he said before heading out to find the girl knowing she hadn't made it far away yet._

Barely registering that she had to close her front door she slipped inside her home. Walking over to the table she sat down placing the letter in front of her. Then just because she was tying to avoid opening that letter, delaying any pain that might come from it, she began to organize the already clean table.

Her whole apartment was clean as she hated a messy space. There was nothing to do to keep her from reading it. Standing up she did the last thing she could before reading, she made tea, before sitting back down.

With a sigh she sat down the tea and gripped the letter delicately in her hands. Slowly she ripped open the top and pulled out the paper that her mother had once held. Had wrote in preparation of not being they're for her child.

Opening it she began to read watching her mother's handwriting explain what was going to happen later that night, the night that she was born, and her mother had died. She had left a seal at the bottom telling her that inside was scrolls left for her, showing her how to use her mother's technique and learn more of her heritage.

It was in the end a short letter, only saying that she was too be born soon, that the contractions were shorter in between, and if the seal to the Kyuubi were to break that they had a back up plan, but she hoped everything would go according to plan. Tears began to leak fast down her face. It fell upon the letter, but she couldn't find it in herself to care. This was the last thing her mother wrote. She was sure shortly after the attack happened. Everything had ended for her in that moment.

The tears fell faster, hotter, than ever before. Her hands began to shake causing the letter to slip from her fingers and land on the floor. Sobs broke through from her mouth as her body began to shake with each one. It was gut wrenching pain that filled her to the very core.

That was all she had of her mother, and it still only scratched the surface of who she was, and only brought more questions. A knock sounded from her door, but she was too far gone to do anything about it. Pushing her hand into her mouth she tried to muffle the sounds coming from her before they alerted whoever was on the other side of the wall.

Another knock. Another sob that was barely covered up. She bit her hand even harder drawing blood in her attempt to stay quiet.

 _"Go away," she screamed in her head._

The sound of a door opening caught her attention, but she didn't do anything about it. She could hear the footsteps of the person coming closer but through her tears and sobs she was left barely mobile.

As the footsteps fell right behind her she could practically feel the hand moving toward her. Gripping a kunai tightly in her hand she spun around aiming the weapon at a critical point in whoever had entered her apartment uninvited.

As her eyes fell upon her target they widened in shock, tears falling even faster. Her attack fell short, the weapon falling from her hand and clattering to the floor. Her body fell forward no longer able to hold her up herself.

Arms wrapped around her pulling her close to a chest, one that she allowed to engulf her in their safety.

"You should have come and got me," whispered a familiar voice. "You shouldn't have to deal with this by yourself." Burying her head deeper into his chest she did not utter a word just those heart wrenching sobs. "I am here for you." He held her while she sobbed only whispering soothing words, holding her close to him as he caressed her hair.

Eventually her sobs changed to hiccups, then to sniffles, and finally nothing. Her body slumped forward announcing that she had fallen asleep. Cradling her in his arms he carefully stood up walking over to her room and lightly kicking open the door before placing her on her bed. Then once he knew she wouldn't be waking up walked out of the room and back over to where the letter had been dropped to the floor.

Picking it up he placed it back on the table. Then to keep himself busy until she woke grabbed the tea cup and cleaned it. He had already decided to stay until she woke to make sure she was ok. He would do that as her older brother, even if not by blood but by choice.

 **~3~**

When Naruko opened her eyes, she was surprised to find that she was in her room, she had no memory of coming here. As she pulled herself up and wiped the sleep from her eyes realization slowly dawned in her mind. She hadn't come here by herself last night, the face of Iruka-nii flooded her mind. He had appeared at her apartment in a time of need and she wondered if it was the Hokage who sent him or perhaps whoever the old man had sent to follow her home last night.

Even though she hadn't realized anyone was there she knew realistically there would be. He wouldn't have left her before knowing if she was ok or not. Getting up she changed into a random orange shirt and blue shorts that she had lying around, not caring if it was her ninja garb or not. Walking into her kitchen she was met with the sight of Iruka at her stove making breakfast. She could smell bacon and see the eggs cooking.

Walking over to the table she sat down watching the one person that was the closest thing to blood she would ever have. She was lucky that he had taken to her, had given her a chance, otherwise she never would have had this experience. Someone to care for her, to watch over her, to protect her.

"What are you doing, Iruka-nii?" she asked as she leaned forward.

"I'm making you breakfast before you go training today," he said turning to send her a smile. "After yesterday I figured you would need it." His eyes trailed to where the letter sat on the table. Naruko's own eyes moved to follow where his gaze was.

"Oh, yeah, that, I'll get to it eventually." She picked up the letter and sat it aside. "I'd like to go train first. Before I get into all of that. All it is, is my mother's heritage and jutsu's." Naruko sent a small smile that said how unsure how she felt. It's a little too early for me to open it."

"When you do, and you want someone to be there for you let me know ok," he said walking over to pat her knee before turning back to scoop up the food onto a plate.

"I could have made myself breakfast you know," she said with a smile feeling a little better. Her nerves were still fried but it was better now. "I know how to cook." Iruka shrugged as he set the plate in front of her.

"Just eat up kid," he said before sitting across from her eating his own plate. Naruko knew that she wouldn't deny him this. The feeling of being cared for was too powerful it pulled her back from lashing out at him for mentioning the letter. She was close to telling him to leave so that she could just forget about last night until she was ready to dwell into her past, but she had gone years without knowing the love of another person.

Here was her chance, a person willingly giving her affection. She couldn't shove that away so easily. This was her precious person, so she sat there and ate the food he had prepared. Her fork scraped an empty plate before she was aware of it. She blinked before sending him a smile and jumping up to her feet.

"Alright, Iruka-nii!" she yelled as she headed for the door. "I've got to go to practice now. I meet not even beat Kakashi-sensei. Let yourself out." Iruka watched her leave as he cleaned the dirtied dishes before leaving her apartment. Putting his hands in his pocket he shook his head as he thought about Naruko. She was family too him, even if not so long ago he saw her as something else.

 **~3~**

Naruko ran up to where Sasuke and Sakura were waiting on the bridge they were told to wait at. "He hasn't made it yet?" Naruko asked surprised she had made it before him. It was at least two hours later than they were supposed to meet up.

"What are you doing here so late, Dobe?" Sasuke asked eyeing her and noticing the slightly puffier look to her eyes. He had seen her yesterday walking through the village with a letter wrapped tightly in her hands. He had been surprised that it hadn't ripped in her grip.

"Just got up late is all," she said defensively as she turned away from him, her pigtails bouncing with the movement. "And then Iruka-nii made me breakfast."

"He was there this morning," he asked still irritated with their relationship.

"What do you care, Teme," she growled as she walked up to him. "Wanna get some training in while we wait for Sensei?" He nodded pushing himself off from the bridge railing causing Sakura to pout as she watched them. Naruko bounced up and down in excitement as she watched him get into a fighting stance. In an instance she went from a bubble of joy to deadly serious, she herself going into a fighting stance right before Sasuke attacked, dashing forward to throw a punch that she quickly deflected and used the momentum to throw herself backwards, so she could rush forward and counter attack, throwing up a leg to hit his face.

He gripped her leg blocking the attack and threw her away from him, the dance continued like that for a while before Kakashi showed up reading his book. He glanced up at them noticing they strictly kept to taijutsu and nothing else.

"Good morning team," he said as he pocketed the book. "I got lost on the path of life." Naruko rolled her eyes as she jumped back cancelling the training session. Sasuke moved back as well his hands immediately being placed in his pocket.

"You know we never believe that Kakashi-sansei," Naruko said turning to place her hands behind her back and gave her sensei a smile. Sasuke just sent him an annoyed look and waited for their boring assignment.

"Can't you ever be on time," Sakura asked as she leant against the bridge.

"My students wound me," he said as he placed a hand over his heart. Sasuke scoffed as he motioned for the man to just give them their assignment already. The faster they could finish it the faster he was able to leave them.

"So, what are we doing today sensei?" Naruko asked as she walked over to him. "Hopefully something a little more exciting than those boring missions we have been doing. It's been like forever since our last real mission." This was something the whole team seven agreed on. Sasuke and Naruko both wished for something a little more like their last mission, even though Sakura could do with fewer life or death situations.

Kakashi sighed but went ahead and told them what they were doing that day, and none of them were too thrilled by it.

By the end of the mission Naruko was being half carried down the street by Sasuke who was just internally cursing the blonde. Externally he was also mumbling incoherent words of what Naruko liked to think of as the Uchiha rudeness.

"You didn't have to over do it, baka," he said as he half dragged her.

"Oh, shut up bastard," she mumbled as she leaned a little more against him. Even she had to admit it, she had over done it, but she always found herself trying to prove that she was just as good as Sasuke when he was around.

Sakura frowned as she watched the two, already able to sense the familiarity between the two. They constantly fought but she could tell it was becoming less of rivalry and more of friendship. She found herself losing to the blonde, she believed herself to be the weak link out of the three of them. It saddened her to know that at some time the blonde had overpassed her.

Kakashi watched the three and sighed, "Your team work has been lacking here lately."

"Seems like he's talking to you," Naruko said as she pulled herself up to a standing position without the help of Sasuke.

"No, he was talking to you," Sasuke said with a sneer. "You're the one in my debt if you don't remember."

"I don't remember being in anyone's debt!" Naruko said pushing herself completely away from the raven-haired boy. She frowned at him as he mimicked her expression, both becoming sourer with the other.

"How about to get out of my debt, you become better than me?" Sasuke said with a smirk which only caused the blonde to grow angrier as she full on glared at the boy. Naruko gritted her teeth as she stared at him. The boy in front of her was so confusing, she found herself constantly fighting between liking him and hating him.

During their first real mission she had found herself enjoying his company as they fought to come out on top during training, and then when she saw him almost die, and had lost it there for a moment, she had found that she did have some kind of comradeship with him. Then moments like these she wasn't even sure why she liked him at all. Kakashi stared up at the sky noticing the hawk flying above and turned his attention back to his bickering students.

"Call it a day guys," he said hoping to calm down the situation. "Got to go turn in our report." Sasuke without another word turned around and parted with only that he was leaving to go home. Naruko growing angrier huffed as she turned away as well only stopping when she heard the pinkette call out for Sasuke.

"Sasuke!" she yelled running up to him. "You wouldn't mind working on our team work, together would you? J-just the two of us?" Naruko could hear the tremble in her voice, the unsureness under all the lovey front she put up.

"You're just as bad as Naruko," Sasuke said turning around. Naruko spun around with a huff of anger. Just as bad as her!? She never threw herself at Sasuke, and never would. Naruko had to hold herself back from snarling at the boy. She was not on the same level as the other girl, she didn't objectify herself to flirting and trying to get on someone's good graces. "Why waste time flirting when you could be training. Even her skills are better than yours."

Naruko rolled back on her heels, even she thought that was pretty harsh. Granted she was better than Sakura, but Sasuke could have said it nicer. Though the boy didn't seem to have a nice guy button. He was always very blunt and rude, Sakura really should have expected it. Still though she could see the hurt on her teammates eyes. When Sasuke turned around and took his gloomy self elsewhere, Naruko watched as Sakura slumped in on herself. She really wasn't good with being put down, Naruko noticed.

Sighing she walked over to where Sakura stood looking crestfallen. "Sakura-chan," she said coming to stand next to the irritating girl. "If you would like to I can train with you." She watched as Sakura seemed to stiffen but never got the chance to speak when Naruko spun around sensing several people behind her.

Frowning all she saw was a badly disguised what she hoped was a rock, otherwise they had really failed at disguising themselves. "What are you doing?" she asked with a raised eyebrow. She already had a good idea who would be hiding within the rock. "You should really work on your disguises. No rock has perfect angles, corners, and eye holes." She gave them a kind smile as it was lifted and revealed her fan group.

"Leave it to the woman I acknowledge to be my almost equal," Konohamaru said as him and his two friends appeared. "It seems your skills rival my own." Naruko smirked as she stared down at them knowing that at their level it didn't take much to do that. She was fond of them though and allowed them to believe what they wanted. They were cute.

"What's up guys?" she asked noticing the goggles on each of their heads, just like the one's she use to wear. Blushing lightly at what that meant she shook her head before focusing on them, slightly forgetting about Sakura.

"Can you come with us boss?" Konohamaru asked motioning for her to follow them. Trying to decide whether she wanted to break their hearts and tell them she had to train or play with them and turn it into training for herself, and them. Konohamaru began to send her the puppy dog eyes, making them bigger and more teary than usual, causing her resolve to begin to waver. Ayame really did have a soft spot for the kids, usually giving into whatever, they wanted fairly easy as long as she didn't have really important stuff to do.

"Alright, guys, I'll play ninja with you ok," she said with a sigh. "But I can only play for a little while alright, I still got to train today." All three kids began to bounce up in excitement as they tackled her causing her to have to regain her balance before steadying herself and the three younger children.

"Great boss!" Konohamaru yelled as he detangled himself from the dog pile and took off running causing his two friends to follow quickly after him, meaning that Naruko had to be the chaser, her job was to catch them. Sending Sakura, a look that conveyed there wasn't anything she could do, she went to turn around to take off after them but froze when she heard Konohamaru call out like he was hurt. Frowning the blonde took off in the direction the three kids had went, Sakura following closely behind her.

"That's not part of the game," Naruko said worriedly when she heard the noise. Infusing Chakra in her feet she was able to run much faster and found the kids within only a minute. She skidded around the corner and her eyes widened at what she saw. "Konohamaru!" There a kid wearing black clothes and had purple face paint was holding him up threateningly, a grimace on his face.

"Knock it off!" the four-pigtailed blonde said glaring at the boy she was with. "You're going to get it as it is."

"What are you doing," Naruko said angrily as she stepped forward. She didn't like seeing someone picking on someone she considered a precious person. "Put him down now!" Naruko took a threatening step forward ready to protect her friend if he didn't comply.

"Don't worry pigtails," the purple faced guy said still holding up Konohamaru up causing the small boy to cry out in pain. "I just want to play while we're waiting for the nuisance to get here." Naruko glared her anger getting worse, she did not like people picking on others. It reminded her to much of how she grew up. Without thinking she let her emotions control her as she took off over to where they were completely ready to snatch up her friend.

Only one thing messed up her plan and that was when the stranger moved his fingers and the next thing she knows she felt a tripping sensation, and then she was sprawled on the ground. Allowing the anger haze to leave her mind she stared up shocked at the stranger trying to figure out what he had done. Her mind whirled with what could have happened.

Standing up she shook her head trying to calm her emotions so what happened before didn't happen again. Taking a more cautious step forward she frowned at him, or blue eyes twinkling in dislike.

"You're starting to annoy me, it's bad enough your short little kid, you're also disrespecting your elders, and that truly makes me want to kill him." Naruko froze, her eyes wide, wondering if the boy would attempt that on the smaller boy. If he did she knew she would have to stop it.

"I won't be held responsible for any of this," the girl companion said with a shake of her head. She didn't even look bothered by what was going on, like this was a normal day for her. Naruko tried to figure out how this would be a normal day for anyone.

"I'll finish this shrimp off and then deal with the others," the stranger said as he brought up his fist ready to hit Konohamaru, making Naruko jump into action racing toward the small boy. Just as she was placing herself in front of the grandson to the Hokage and take the hit herself, a rock flew out of nowhere, hitting the older boy's hand, causing him to hiss and cradle his hand.

"What are you guys doing in our village?" Sasuke asked sitting up in a tree, holding onto another rock, having it ready in case the stranger needed to be persuaded more. Naruko, who had been wincing waiting for the blow, opened her eyes and stared at Sasuke, whom she hadn't even noticed arrive. Relief flooded her body, happy to have not actually been hit. Even though she would have happily taken the hit for Konohamaru.

Konohamaru was dropped after he squirmed a little, the stranger letting him go in his shock. Naruko glared as she grabbed the young boy's shirt and pulled him away, over by Sakura where it was safe.

Her grip on his shirt never loosened as they came to a stop in front of his friends. She was too wound up to just let him go now, too worried that he would be dragged back into danger again.

"Look another little brat," the black cladded stranger said as he massaged his hand against the pain. Sasuke sighed his eyes narrowing at him, not appreciating the fact that the boy had almost decked Naruko.

"Get lost," Sasuke said standing up so he was leaning against the tree. Here he was able to get a better view of the blonde making sure she hadn't been touched. He could see feint scrape on her face that he frowned at but nothing serious had been done.

"How cool!" Sakura said holding her hands up to her face in admiration. Her eyes were like hearts causing Naruko to sigh. Shaking her head, she turned her attention to her other team mate, secretly happy that he had intervened. She really didn't want to get hit in the face.

"Come down here!" the stranger called out. "Freaking squirrel thinking he's so smart." Pulling something off his back that Naruko thought suspiciously looked like a person he faced Sasuke. It was obvious the guy had been irritated beyond belief. His friend widened her eyes at the display.

"You can't be using crow now!" she yelled. "Kankuro don't!" Naruko frowned at the display wondering what it was that he was about to use. If his friend didn't want him to it wouldn't be anything good. She stood in a defensive stance waiting to back up Sasuke if she had too. She only hoped that it wouldn't get that far.

"You're a disgrace to our entire village," a new voice said, announcing that someone else had arrived without her noticing. She hated knowing that yet someone else had snuck up on her without her knowledge. Naruko grimaced knowing that she had to get better, to get stronger, no one would be able to get pass her. "It's annoying that you'd lose control in a quarrel with children." She grumbled under her breath at the thought that he had called her a child, he was her same age, though she was sure he was talking more about Konohamaru. "Don't you remember why we came here."

"The kid started it Gaara, he ran into me!" Kankuro begged trying to get him to understand. "He ran into me." Gaara stared at him, his sea foam green eyes hard and angry, causing Naruko to shiver at the killer intent rolling off him in waves.

"Shut up," Gaara hissed. "Or I will kill you." It was like a switch was turned on inside both red heads teammates, then began to shake in what she could only tell was fear. They feared this kid. Her blue eyes widened at the display, never having seen someone like this before. He gave her the creeps.

"You're completely right Gaara," Kankuro said holding up his hands in defense. The blonde girl that was with them was also shaking.

"We're sorry Gaara," she stuttered out. Naruko couldn't believe that just one person had that affect on people that they should have trusted and relied on. His glare was stunning, she couldn't imagine having to team up with someone like that.

"I'm sorry about my friends," Gaara said turning his attention to Sasuke. Naruko frowned, he should be apologizing to them, Sasuke just showed up in time to help.

Gaara stared at the black-haired kid, he had ailed Kankuro with just a stone, that took skill, he understood that. Turning his attention to the blonde he found it hard to understand why she had placed herself between the small boy and Kankuro's punch. Willing to take the shot herself so the boy didn't.

That was something he didn't understand.

"I know we're a little early, but you know we didn't come here to play around," Gaara said as he reappeared down where they were all, sand swarming around his body before it settled to reveal him.

"I promise it won't happen again Gaara," Kankuro said. "Really."

"Let's go," the red-head said turning his back and beginning to walk away. When Sakura stepped forward, pushing Naruko out of the way, the blonde couldn't believe why she had done it. The red-head was scary, not someone she wanted around herself at all.

"Wait!" the pinkette said gaining his attention and causing him to halt.

"Yes?" Gaara said turning around to stare at the girl. His patience was beginning to wear thin.

"You're hiatate say that you're from the Village Hidden in the Sand," Sakura began and then Naruko understood what she was doing. She was trying to figure out why foreign ninja were in their village. "I know your country is one of Konoha's allies, but still our treaty states that your ninja cannot cross our border without authorization. So, State your business! We can't just let you go until we know."

The blonde Suna ninja dug into her pockets, looking for the proof they were asking for. Grabbing a hold of it she pulled out the pass that allowed them within the gates of Konoha.

"Ever heard the old saying about it being darkest at the base of the brightest house, weren't you informed," the blonde girl said as she held up the pass for them to see.

"Informed of what," Naruko asked stepping forward along with Sakura to check out the pass.

"We're here to take the Chunin exams for this year." Naruko nodded knowing about the Chunin exams, they happened twice a year after all. She had never personally been to one, never had the chance to go. This year she wanted to go, but it would be even better if she could participate. As the blonde was showing her pass Sasuke appeared down next to Naruko. His eyes looked over her now that he was closer, making sure he hadn't missed anything from before. Once he was sure that nothing had damaged her more than the scratch on her face that was already pretty much healed he turned his attention back to the foreign ninjas.

"What's your name?" he asked glaring at the red-head. The blonde began to blush thinking he was talking to her causing Naruko to be annoyed at the attention he was giving her.

"Who me?" she asked all happily causing Naruko to roll her eyes.

"No," Sasuke said. "I was talking to the spook beside you." That caused the two flanking him to look confused before glancing over at Gaara.

"My name is Gaara of the Desert," he said glaring at Sasuke. "And your name?"

"Uchiha Sasuke," he said with a smirk. Gaara then turned to stare at the girl Sasuke seemed to purposefully place himself in front of as soon as the Suna Shinobi turned his attention towards her.

"And your name?" Sasuke glared completely putting himself to block the view of Naruko.

"Her name is none of your business," Sasuke snapped causing Gaara to smirk and nod. Naruko frowned wondering what was up with Sasuke, she had no problem telling this creep what her name was. Hell, he had wanted to know. Shaking her head, she just thought what she always thought, Sasuke was weird. He never made any sense, especially with the way he acted.

Grumbling she just shook her head as she watched them leave. Turning to Sasuke she glared.

"What was that about," she asked angrily and annoyed. He turned so he could stare at her, noticing how upset she was.

"Hn," he said before walking away causing her to chase after him, demanding that he answer.

"So, help me Sasuke!" she yelled as she ran.


	8. Exams Part One: Believe It!

**A Path Rewritten**

 **Chapter Eight**

 **Exams Part One: Believe it!**

 **Sorry this took me so long. I'm like a month over due but life yah know. I got in the mood to finish this chapter and wrote over half of it yesterday and today, and that's all I needed! I was stuck right before the Chunin exams forever, for some reason I just couldn't force myself to start it and I refuse to write if I'm not in the mood, it just turns into bad writing and no one wants to read that. I'll be having time skips after the Chunin exams, and some big building of Naruko and Sasuke relationship.**

Naruko stared down at the scroll her mother had given to her, rolling it in her hands as she tried to figure out whether to open it. She wouldn't mind knowing some of her mothers' techniques, and she was sure it could help her grow stronger. With a sigh she unrolled the scroll and applied some of her Chakra to it. In a puff of smoke, a scroll appeared along with a couple of weird kunai and a letter.

Putting aside the scroll and kunai she decided to deal with the letter first. She had such a bad reaction to the first one that she hoped she dealt with it better. Naruko had considered asking Iruka to come over as she did it, but she wanted some privacy when she opened it. Taking a sigh, she unfurled the letter and recognized the handwriting as still her mothers.

 _These Kunai were your fathers, with a special seal he applied to them he could transport himself anywhere they were placed. These he left unmarked, so you could fine your own form of Fūinjutsu once you're able. I have left you some of my own work within this scroll, and directions on how to use them, hoping that you can one day figure them out._

 _With Love,_

 _Your mother_

Glancing down at the scroll she went through the hand seals to release the contents and indeed inside were several more papers on Fūinjutsu showing her how to do it, how to make her own, and her mothers own personal way of doing it, with several examples. Her eyes widened at the contents and she began to devour the knowledge wanting to learn everything that her parents had been able to do. Her eyes hungrily drank everything in as she went through each of the miniature scrolls it only took a couple hours to finish.

Her mother even though only being able to give her a couple scrolls on the technique still made it as detailed as she could and made sure to give her several pointers. The scrolls were bulky as was and Naruko wondered to herself if her mother had prepared them in advance, fearful that she wouldn't be able to teach her child herself.

She caught herself holding back a sob as it built up in her throat, but she was determined to be strong about this. However, the thought of her mother preparing for her own demise settled horribly in her stomach and she had to shove the scrolls away from her violently. It was unfair! Why did she have to lose her parents and have the thing that killed them sealed inside of herself. With a disgusted grunt she pushed herself to her feet and began to pace the room.

Why was it so hard! She had never met this person and even though she never had it still made her feel sick inside and hurt. It killed her to know that this was from someone who had given birth to her, who would have been good to her, would have loved her.

Clutching at her stomach she grunted once more before throwing herself toward her door. She needed a distraction, she needed something, someone, to take away the pain she was feeling, to take away this horrible gut wrenching feeling that was taking over her mind and body. She had deserved love, deserved to feel wanted. Naruko never got to experience that and it hurt!

Shoving it open her body moved on its own accord to outside and took to the roof tops. Her mind barely registered that the sun was setting and soon darkness would fall upon them, but she didn't care. Her feet carried her over the roof tops toward the direction that she was subconsciously leading too. Consciously her mind wasn't thinking of anything, just mindlessly wondering searching for something to keep her mind off what hurt her heart.

So, when she arrived in front of a barely familiar apartment door Naruko almost hit herself as she rested her hand against the door, a firm knock resounding throughout the hallway. Naruko stared in horror at her hand wondering how it had betrayed her in such a way. Why had her body led her here? He wouldn't be able to help her! He didn't even like her, she wasn't even sure she liked him! Before she was able to quickly disappear knowing that he would answer the door at any moment it swung open.

Her breath caught as her eyes widened in shock as his face appeared in front of her. His onyx eyes stared into her own cerulean blue ones, hardening once he realized who had been at his door.

"Hn," he said his gaze looking over her as he spotted the unshed tears that built up inside of them causing them to shine even brighter. "What are you doing here?" Her mouth fell open into an 'O' as her mind tried to catch up with itself, so she could answer. Her mind was racing, and she asked herself what she was even doing here.

"I-I-I u-um, I'm n-not sure," she stuttered out eyes still wide as she took a step back in confusion. His eyes narrowed as he took in her condition noticing the way her body shook, not once had her eyes cleared, and she looked to have come out of a daze.

"Come with me, dobe," Sasuke said with a sigh as he walked past the blonde-haired girl. His eyes had hardened as he began to head for the exit causing Naruko to just stand there still frozen her eyes moving to follow his movements. "Well?" His voice caused her to flinch snapping her out of her numbness and finally after a moments hesitation she began to follow him from the apartment building.

Neither spoke has the moon began to rise into the sky the only light that showed them their path, but they weren't bothered by this. It was something they were used to following on missions, the moon was a normal light source for shinobi. Naruko glanced around trying to see if the buildings they past would help her realize where they were heading too. Where would Sasuke even take her at this time of night, and after she had disturbed his peace?

A frown marred her face at that thought. He probably wasn't happy, wherever they were going it was probably a place to kill her. At that thought her body stiffened as she began to watch him, every movement he made didn't go unnoticed by her. As they entered the tree's she began to glance around their surroundings easily recognizing the area they were at.

"What are we doing here?" she asked as they stopped in the middle of training grounds three. This happened to be where they had their very first training with Kakashi-sensei. Sasuke turned to stare at her a bored look in gaze as he just stared at her for a couple long moments.

"Wouldn't you like to train?" he asked waving his hand around the area like it was an obvious answer. Her mind raced back to her earlier jumbled thoughts and how all she wanted was just to be distracted from it, so she could go back at it with a clear mind. Finally, slowly, her head nodded as she entered her fighting stance.

He followed her lead and they kept it strictly taijutsu. Naruko didn't need to do any fancy ninjutsu and she sucked at genjutsu, all she needed was taijutsu to keep her occupied and her mind only on the movements she was doing and how to block his. Sasuke noticed how her body relaxed and whatever had her high strung was easing from her mind. He picked up the pace only allowing her attention on him. He attacked relentlessly causing her to dodge and focus on how to attack him back, looking for any opening he may accidentally give her.

They trained for what felt like hours and it was only when Sasuke noticed the sweat covering her body and the exhausted look that weighed heavily over her face that he reached out and stopped her. His action that wasn't meant for attacking startled her allowing him to grab her arm and pull her to an abrupt stop.

His eyes locked with hers and she froze. She was hyper aware of his hand on her arm, where their skin touched sparked with life. By the way his eyes widened by only a fraction she could tell he felt it too. It wasn't just something that she had made up in her mind, it was real. Sasuke was the first one to break the moment. His hand snatched from her arm glaring down at it like he had been burned.

Without a word he walked away crossing the training grounds with swift long strides and exited into the tree's where he disappeared. Her breath which had been coming out in gasps had begun to slow down.

Her chest no longer falling and rising with seconds of the last breath. It had settled down and was rising and falling with ease. Her mind spun at the notion of what happened, but she just shook her head not wanting to open that train of thought. Turning around she began to make her way back home ready to clean up the mess she left and deal with learning Fūinjutsu later.

 **~3~**

Naruko ran toward the bridge where they usually met to be given their mission for the day. She wasn't exactly looking forward to another day of a mindless C-rank, but it gave her money and her rent was due in another week. Along with rent she also needed more groceries as she was beginning to run low, heaven forbid Iruka-nii came over in the next couple days, he would get so mad and then drag her out to buy food for her himself. She hated when he did that even though she knew he only did it out of care.

Though his weekly visits were due sometime soon. As she slowed to a walk once she was able to see her two teammates her stomach dropped at the sight of Sasuke. He had acted different last night, she had shown him a version of herself most people other than Iruka never got to see. It was a little embarrassing for her, but she was determined to act like it never happened.

So what if she couldn't handle the things her mother had left behind for her. That was for her to deal with and figure out.

Her blue eyes had hardened by the time she had stood in front of her teammates causing Sakura to frown in worry over her normally cheerful teammate.

"Is there anything wrong Naruko-chan?" Sakura asked with real worry tinting her voice. That was odd enough to Naruko. Normally the two girls didn't get along all that well. Hell, none of their teammates seemed to get along well, they were always arguing and fighting with one another.

"Nothing," she muttered as she walked over to the railing and used her arms to pull herself up on it to sit down and wait for their forever late Sensei. The wind blew threw her hair causing her to wonder if she should cut her hair and that thought only made her shake her head. It didn't matter if it was more practical to keep it short in battle, she liked her hair long. She liked that it reached down past her backside when it was allowed to be free from the pigtails she kept it in.

Her bangs always fell into her eyes, but she liked her hiatate around her neck and wasn't really in a rush to do anything about it, it wasn't to bothersome. Another sigh left her mouth as she glanced around, her eyes roaming over her two teammates and the tree's that were on either side of the bridge.

Sakura was in the process of trying to get Sasuke to go out to eat BBQ with her after their mission but Sasuke continued to ignore her, staring anywhere but at the pinkette. His onyx eyes were set in a hard glare as the constant badgering at him was getting on his nerves. Naruko could tell he was about to blow, his Uchiha etiquette keeping him from completely losing it at the third member of their team.

Naruko sighed knowing that it would be quite a while longer before Kakashi-sensei would show up and figured they could at least get some training time in. Sasuke losing it wasn't something she particularly wanted to experience, her least favorite pink haired girl wasn't helping matters now. Pushing herself off from the railing she walked over to where they stood. Crossing her arms, she stared at the two, her eyes now glinting happily at the idea of sparring, she didn't want to stay in a bad mood, that was for when she was alone at home, no one else was around to witness it. Naruko was determined to get her mind off everything that was bothering her now that she was with her teammates, they were the perfect distractions for her.

"Would you like to spar Sakura, Sasuke?" she asked in a bubbly voice as she began to bounce on the balls of her feet. Sakura hesitated her eyes drifting over to Sasuke to see what he would say. She didn't want to spar if he didn't want too, she planned on completely following him in whatever. Hearts seemed to sparkle in her eyes as she grabbed a hold of his wrist.

"Yes, Sasuke, what would you like to do?" she asked in a gushy voice that caused Sasuke and Naruko to wince. He gripped her fingers and pried them off his wrist as he tried to put space between the two of them. His eyes narrowed as she glared at her in announce. _Couldn't she just leave me alone, instead of bothering me all day?_

Naruko just stared waiting for their replies as she thought about talking to Sakura, the girl was just too invested in the Uchiha, someone who didn't even care about her, she should really focus more on training instead of boy's, especially those who didn't care. The wave mission had caused Naruko's' eyes to open and realize that their life styles were more dangerous than she had ever thought, and she didn't want Sakura to come to that realization too late, and it be the last thing she did.

Sakura was her new teammate, even if they never got along, the other girl always seeing her as competition against Sasuke, even though the blonde didn't care about the dark-haired boy in that way, she still cared for her. She even cared for Sasuke even though his 'I don't care attitude' was annoying. This was her team and dammit she wanted it to feel like a team, she wanted to work like one, and care for each other like one. Why did she have to be put on the one where everyone seemed to be incompetent on getting along, hell even their sensei didn't seem to be that invested. He was always late, and even then, training was limited.

She hoped to fix all that, it was about time they all acted like a proper team.

"Hn," Sasuke said announcing that he had made his decision, though Naruko only gazed at him in confusion as the boy walked away leaving behind the two girls. It was confusing when he only answered things one worded.

"Hey, teme, what does that mean?" she asked and even Sakura watched the boy intently trying to work it out. Turning around he sighed in irritation as he turned back around and waved over his shoulder as he crossed the bridge and walked over to where there was a clear space between the tree's and the opening of the bridge.

Both girls followed quickly after him, Sakura having decided that it was worth to train if Sasuke wanted to and if it got her noticed by him. Naruko was just happy to be able to hone her skills. All three were against each other, dodging, hitting, and trying to outsmart one another. Sakura lagged behind, but she was able to keep up with the other two for the most part, it made her realize that she needed to start training harder or she was going to be left behind.

"Yo," Kakashi said as he eyed his three students getting along long enough to train with one another. It made him realize they needed to work harder to be more in tune with one another. He had his work cut out for him but for the news he was about to give them they would need to come to that understanding or they would never pass.

"Sensei!" Sakura yelled as she spun around her eyes flaming. "You're late!"

"Aren't you ever going to be on time?" Naruko asked as she adjusted the hiatate around her neck. "Or should I start to pick up on the habit of being late?"

"Mah, mah, my cute little student's I came across this little old lady who needed help carrying her groceries, how could I just leave her to do it herself?" he asked in a tone that clearly sounded like he was lying. He wasn't even trying to hide the fact that his lies were lies. Naruko shook her head but smiled at her neurotic sensei.

"You could just tell us the truth that your too lazy," Sasuke muttered as he dug his hands into his pockets waiting for his sensei to tell them what they were doing today.

"Now is that any way to talk to your precious sensei?" Kakashi asked his eye glinting in fake hurt. All three students raised their eyebrows but said nothing, none of them buying his tone of betrayal. "Don't you want to know what I've brought you three?" Kakashi asked holding up three sheets of paper with the blank sides facing them.

Naruko would be lying if she wasn't at least curious about what was in his hands. Even the ever stoic Sasuke glanced at them in curiosity about what their sensei could possibly have in his hands.

"What is it sensei?" Sakura asked in curiosity as she tried to glance around and catch a sight of what was written, only for Kakashi to move them away from her eyesight and give them a one-eyed smile.

"I've nominated you three for the Chunin selection exams," he said as he turned the three papers over to reveal what they said. Each one was an application for them to fill out before the exams.

"Really Kakashi-sensei!" Naruko yelled out in excitement, as she tackled her sensei in a hug, that the Jonin then tried to immediately detach the blonde.

"Ack! Naruko let me go," he yelled as his hands gripped around her arms tightly tugging her body away from his own. Sasuke glared and rolled his eyes as he walked over and helped detach the overly excited who then clutched tightly to the paper she had grabbed from Kakashi and stared at it happily. She had been hoping to apply as soon as those Shinobi from Suna had arrived the other day. The red-head had struck her curiosity and she wanted to prove she had what it took to become strong enough to move up the ranks, after all she was to become the Hokage.

Once Sasuke was sure the girl wouldn't try to attack their sensei again he let go of her arm, but the blonde didn't even realize she had been dragged away to busy staring at the application. Kakashi then passed the last two sheets to his other two students who then began to look over it themselves.

"This is just a nomination," Kakashi said as he dug his hands into his pockets and stared at his students. "It's entirely up to the three of you to decide whether or not to take them. You have until 4 at room 301 tomorrow afternoon to sign them and turn them in. So, take the time until then to decide if you want to do it or not." Without another word he disappeared leaving his students alone to ponder on what they would decide to do.

Naruko didn't even care that he had bailed on them without even trying to teach them today, she couldn't wait to go home and fill it out. She barely sensed that her teammates had begun to walk away, and her legs automatically began to follow them. She was just so excited!

"Can you believe he put our names in this?!" she yelled out in glee barely noticing the look of uncertainty on Sakura's face, while Sasuke's was still as blank as ever. This was her chance to prove her worth, that she could do it, and that no one could beat her. She was going to go all the way, believe it! "This is so exciting, yah know!"

Sasuke's eyes slid over to where the blonde bounced along beside them excitedly, he couldn't believe someone could be this happy about an exam but if he was being honest he was looking forward to seeing if he would be paired up with that red-head from the other day. He sure hoped so. Neither one noticed the pink haired girl fall behind them as she stared at their backs, both excited in their own way.

Sakura, however, wasn't looking forward to it, her fears were getting the better of her. She was falling behind it was obvious even to her, she couldn't even keep up with Naruko who in the beginning didn't seem to get it. Now look at her, the sheer amount of shadow clones she could do was amazing, and she didn't even try to put herself in the same league as Sasuke. If she couldn't keep up with them, then how would she with anyone else?

Her eyes fell onto the paper growing sad, disappointed, and worthless, as she continued her way home by herself.

 **~3~**

Naruko bounced around barely realizing when Sasuke diverted toward his own home once they met at the intersection that took them to their homes. He barely uttered a 'hn' in departure before moving away as she was too busy still starring down in happiness at the paper. She ran the rest of her way home to begin filling out the paper, her eyes dancing across each line and signed her name where it was needed. With a satisfied smile she glanced around her apartment and realized she would need to go shopping if she wanted to each tonight, let alone breakfast for tomorrow so she was well fed and rested before the exams.

With a sigh she pulled herself from the seat at the table and dashed out the front door once more. The quicker she made it to the market the sooner she could get back home, several market sellers were still rude to her not matter if she wore the hiatate of Konoha or not.

As she was walking around picking and buying what she needed, she noticed that there were considerably less glares than normal, causing her to be on edge until a familiar face walked up to her. When she saw Iruka-nii strolling towards her she realized that he must have been following her for a while, they never glared at her with him around.

"What are you doing Iruka-nii?" she asked in curiosity as she grabbed a couple tomatoes. He smiled at her as his hand shot out to mess up her hair causing the blonde to huff but didn't bother to fix it.

"I came to check in on you," he said with a smile as he placed his hands in his pockets and began to follow her. "I'm happy to see that your shopping, thought I would have to drag you out again like the other week."

"I had been busy!" she yelled out with a shake of her head. "I hadn't gotten around to it yet, I was planning on it. I've done this long enough." Iruka frowned at the thought that she had to take care of herself even at a young age when the orphanage had let her go. Since her academy days started they had set her free and the Hokage set her up in an apartment.

He wished he had done something sooner to help her, wished he could allow her to live with him but it wasn't appropriate. Instead he would pop up early for their weekly check ups when he figured she wouldn't have gone shopping yet and then talked her into letting him buy her food, or anything else she needed. Naruko always picked a fight when he did this but he'd just go out of his way to buy it later and then show up on her doorstep with the stuff, so she didn't fight too hard knowing it was a losing battle.

He followed her around for the rest of her shopping, effectively keeping anyone from harassing her too much. He stuck around for dinner before heading out but not until he said congratulations to her about the exams.

 _I've heard that you're entering the exams._

 _Yeah! Kakashi-sensei entered us, isn't that great!?_

 _Just be careful ok? I don't want anything to happen to you, though I'll know you're going to be great!_

Naruko woke up the next morning jumping from her bed and hurriedly throwing on her Shinobi garb wanting to be completely prepared for today. After wrapping up her hands and wrists with bandages she walked over to her kitchen and began to make herself a hearty breakfast, wanting to be ready for whatever was thrown at her today.

Grabbing the paper that she filled out the night before she rushed off toward the Academy going to meet up with her teammates. Sakura and Sasuke were standing out front, today Naruko was the last to arrive. Normally she was the first but taking the time to make breakfast had taken up more time than normal.

"Hey guys!" she said waving excitedly as she ran up to them. Her eyes darted toward where Sakura was looking off, her face downcast, and a worried expression on it. "You OK Sakura?" The girl in question snapped her head up to look at the blonde but just shook her head and gave a nervous little laugh.

"I'm fine, Naruko!" she said without an ounce of truth shining in her voice. Naruko gave her a weird look but knew better than to try to force it out of her. If Sakura didn't want to tell them then that wasn't Naruko's problem.

They all rushed inside, wanting to get signed up before it became to late, none of them wanting to be disqualified, even though Sakura still didn't look to sure about even participating.

Naruko, Sakura, and Sasuke walked down the hallway noticing a bunch of students filed around a room with the number 302 on it. Naruko frowned having sworn they hadn't made it all the way up yet but then again, she could be wrong. That was until Sasuke pointed out that they were only on the second floor, Sakura confirming it, she truly was great at noticing Genjutsu.

Everything happened fast after that, Sasuke tried starting a fight when a boy named Lee got in between them and began to sprout out his love and devotion for Sakura. Said girl could only look at him in confusion and worry, like he was crazy. Lee's teammate walked forward his eyes locked onto Sasuke, the lavender coloring of them moving across Naruko's as well.

"What's your name?" the boy asked as he narrowed his eyes at him. Sasuke once again seemed to subtly stand in front of Naruko causing her to grow angry at the display. How was she supposed to get any recognition if Sasuke was always trying to block her from people! Why couldn't he do that to Sakura! The girl would have loved it.

"I believe it's common courtesy to give your name first," Sasuke said haughtily as he blocked his view of his other teammate.

"You're a rookie, how old?" the boy asked not giving up at all.

"I don't have to answer anything." The lavender eyed guy seemed to be getting a little annoyed with the lack of response, but he had noticed the way the dark-haired guy had blocked his blonde teammate. It was enough to spark his curiosity as he moved over to the left to see the girl better.

"And you are?" he asked his voice not as demanding as before, after all he was only curious.

"Uzumaki Naruko, believe it!" she said with a thumb up excited that someone had asked her for her name. Sasuke glared annoyed at the brown-haired boy and grabbed Naruko's arm pulling her away from the offending male. Sakura frowned but quickly followed them trying to figure out what was wrong with Sasuke, as Naruko hollered to him to let her go.

 **~3~**

Naruko stared at the grey-haired teen that had walked over to them to give them advice, she wasn't entirely sure why someone who was their competitor would willing give them information on anyone else. Kabuto had walked up to them to warn them that they had gained too much attention, and there were other's that wanted to beat them up already. He had been through this exam seven times, which of course caused the blonde to frown, if he had all this information on others than how come he failed that many times?

From the look on Sasuke's face he didn't seem to trust him either, though who did the guy really trust, but was interested in the information that he was willing to give out.

"I want to know about two individuals," Sasuke demanded as he moved closer to the cards, keeping Naruko close to him as he did. The blonde frowned at his actions, but she was curious about the information as well. "Sabaku no Gaara, and Rock Lee from Konoha." Kabuto seemed happy at the names, as he pulled the cards from the pile.

"It makes it easier when you know the names," he said as he flipped them over and announced everything he knew about them. As Kabuto talked Naruko understood one thing clearly, everyone participating in the exams this year were elite Shinobi, some of the best Genin in the world. It caused her to realize she was having to bring her A- game to get through this thing.

Glancing down at the floor she frowned, everyone she had had ran into she had sensed were strong. Was this something she could truly do? To beat all these people that she would go against? Her hands clenched tightly at her side as glared at the tile. Sakura placed her hand on her teammates arm worried that she would be doubting herself now.

"You'll get it Naruko," she said as she patted her arm.

"I'll beat anyone that comes up against me," Naruko said determinedly. "Or my name isn't Uzumaki Naruko! Yah know!" Sakura shook her head, but a small smile lit up her face, happy to see that she wasn't down and unNaruko like.

 **~3~**

After everything that happened next Naruko welcomed the proctor that interrupted everything announcing the start of the exam. "My name is Morino Ibiki," the man gruffly began. "I'm the proctor and Chief examiner for the first start of the exam."

Naruko was given a number as was everyone else and began to search for her seat, which happened to be right next to Hinata, a shy girl from her year at the academy. The girl had always been nice to her but because of her shyness they never grew close. It was something Naruko had tried to work on but was hard when she would just stutter, grow red, and then run away.

"L-let's do our best," Hinata said with a smile at Naruko.

"Yeah!" Naruko said happy that she had actually spoken to her, she could use more female friends in her life.

"Paper's face down until I give the signal," Ibiki said as the papers began to be passed out. "Now listen up." He began to explain to them the rules, which only caused Naruko to frown as they were numbered out. They couldn't cheat, couldn't ask questions, and if one person lost all points then the whole team was punished. She kept listening as he went on about how many different ways points could be deducted, but Naruko noticed he seemed to mention cheating an awful lot, and not only that but they gave you five chances before getting rid of the cheating person.

Why would they offer you that many chances if the whole point was not to cheat? They should have disqualified you the first time you were caught. It was almost like they were trying to get them to cheat.

Glancing down at the first question Naruko read, "Decode the following Cipher and summarize it's meaning." Each question only seemed to get harder and Naruko glared down at the offending paper. This was hard, she didn't even know how to answer most of these questions and she was sure that most of the other genin in the room were in the same rut as herself.

It only left her with one option, to cheat. She would just have to make sure that she was never caught. It wouldn't do to get caught and then disqualified, her teammates would never forgive her. Glaring down at the paper she tried to come up with a solution, she would need to be sneaky.

A kunai flashed across the room, Naruko having sensed it moved her head a little more to the left not wanting to see if that person's aim was great or not. It seemed someone had been caught cheating five times, they were out. That was fast, someone had already been caught that many times, she was going to have to careful about this.

"You can cheat off me if you want, Naruko," Hinata whispered quietly barely being heard, her lips not even moving. It was perfect really, no one would have even known she spoke. A grin lit up Naruko's face at the thought, she could work with that, someone who was smart and had the answers. Her Byakugan would have been able to see the answers from someone else, even though Hinata was smart and wouldn't need to use it anyway. Now she would just need to find out a way to see her answers without anyone noticing her.

That's the hard part, she wasn't sure how she could do that. The Proctors were watching everyone, closely, no room to just glance over. A soft growl left her as she face-palmed the table trying to figure out what she was going to do. She didn't have any jutsu that would magically help give her the answers. Her shadow clones were useless in this situation, if she made one they would see and count a point off.

Growing frustrated Naruko glanced up at the clock, noticing that her time was running out, she would need to find an answer to her problem soon or she would lose her chance. Even if Sasuke, and Sakura got everything right she was sure they would still fail if she didn't answer any of them. Throwing her head back Naruko was left with a thought, she had gone back and dug through her mother's scrolls once more, this time being able to get through them easy.

It wasn't as bad as last time and she read a lot of the scrolls, learning many techniques. Frowning she tried to remember how the seal looked, wondering if it would even work in this instance. She would have to somehow get the seal on Hinata's paper as well, but an idea was already forming into her mind. Quickly scribbling it down on her paper she smiled at the tiny seal, all it would take is the one just like it on Hinata's and she would have her answers.

Naruko bounced from her seat her hand waving enthusiastically through the air gaining the attention of Ibiki. He frowned, his face pulling into a grouchy expression as this was the second person to interrupt the exam.

"Yes?" Ibiki said with a growl. Naruko only smiled innocently as she lowered her hand.

"I've got to use the restroom," she said as she began to bounce up and down putting on a show for what she was about to attempt. Ibiki scowled irritated as yet another one needed to go, but if yet another one wanted to waste their time going to the restroom he wouldn't care. That would be their problem.

"Make it quick!" Naruko nodded happily as she turned to scurry past Hinata to get to the proctor that would take her, but her foot caught the end of Hinata's chair as she was in a hurry. The foul up caused her hand to shoot out for support, hitting the table surface, her hand hitting her own exam sheet, with her momentum she slid forward knocking Hinata's own paper off the table along with her own, Naruko landing on the ground next to them.

"I'm so sorry," Naruko said as she scribbled the seal onto Hinata's paper before snatching up her own and placing it on the table as the proctor came walking over to the blonde. He frowned down at her but saw nothing wrong as the seals were drawn on the back of the papers. It didn't look like Naruko was doing anything wrong, just having been clumsy in her need to pee.

"Let's get going," the woman said with a frown as they both left the room. Sasuke stared at them as they went, wondering what the dobe could possibly be doing wasting time like this. Naruko sped down the hallway, faking that she needed to go bad, which caused the woman to have to run to keep up with the small girl. By the time they entered the bathroom the proctor was pissed and demanding that Naruko 'hurry the hell up.'

Waving in a 'I understand' manner she slid into the stall and thankfully actually had to go as she wasn't sure how she would have pretended to do that. Hurrying through the motions she washed her hands and dashed down the hallway once more only having taken a couple minutes. There would still be fifteen left, plenty enough time for Hinata to rewrite down the test if her seal worked.

Moving back into the room she waited for the cuffs to come off and dashed for her seat. Flying through the hand signs to activate the seal her paper began to lightly glow, barely noticeable unless you were looking for it. Next to her Hinata's own paper glowed in the same way. There in all it's glory was Hinata's answers clearly written on her own paper now. All she had to do was erase the name and write down her own.

Hinata smiled at the small seal, impressed the Naruko knew such a seal, and began to rewrite her answers. Naruko followed suit knowing that Hinata's handwriting would have given her away. She memorized the whole paper erased it and rewrote it in her own handwriting. Both girls finished in time for Ibiki to speak back up, announcing that it was time for the tenth question.

"Get ready for the tenth question! Before we get to the question I'm adding one newer rule, this one is absolute. First you must choose whether or not to accept or reject this question." Naruko frowned wondering why they would even give them that choice, what was the consequences.

"What happens if someone doesn't accept it?" asked the Suna girl Naruko ran into the other day. She didn't seem happy with the choices. Ibiki grew intense his eyes darkening, a shadow falling across his face.

"If you reject the question and don't even try to answer it you'll lose all your points immediately and fail! That of course means both your team mates fail with you." Naruko stared in confusion, no one in their right mind would choose such a choice. There had to be such a bad consequence that happened someone would willingly choose it. She wasn't sure if she was going to like what he was about to say.

"The other rule is if you start the last question but get it wrong you will never be permitted to apply for the Chunin exams again. Never!" This caused an uproar, everyone began to get angry and fearful, second guessing whether or not they wanted to do this.

"You can't be serious!" Kiba yelled, Naruko was able to recognize his voice and Akamaru barking in anger. "There have been other Shinobi who have taken this exam more than once!" Ibiki began to laugh, no humor was in his voice, instead it caused a chill to run up Naruko's spine.

"Well then it proves the type of rotten luck you all have as I wasn't making the rules these past years, I am now. I've been up front with you. You can take a failing grade now and try again later. Anyone who has doubts would be smart to reject the tenth question, come back and reapply next year, and the year after that. If even one member of a cell rejects the question than all his team fail for the year. If anyone accepts the question and can't answer it, he'll be stuck at the genin level for the rest of his life!"

Naruko stared wide eyed at the man. Who could make a choice like this? If she got it wrong, she would never rise up the ranks, she would be stuck a genin forever. Her eyes narrowed, as her fists clenched under the table. Glancing over at Hinata she saw that the girl was also looking uncomfortable and upset.

"Those who would choose not to accept should raise their hands now, once their number have been confirmed, they will leave the room. People around her began to raise their hands one by one they left the room, causing Naruko to grow even more tense.

If she stayed here, accepted the question, answered it and got it wrong it would all be over. She would have dragged Sasuke and Sakura down with here, they would all be Genin forever. She would have failed them, and their dreams. Her body began to shake as she thought of the choice she would make, once before it was the easiest decision until now. She had to think about them, not just herself, but she had dreams too. She couldn't just back down now!

She would accept this answer, she would get it right, and she would become Hokage! For that was her ninja way! There was no backing down now!

Her hand raised in the air, growing tired of those leaving the room and giving up. Her body shook, her hand visibly was moving, and rookie 9 was all staring at her in shock, not believing that she was raising her hand to give in. This was not the Naruko that they all knew and loved.

Her hand strike through the air slamming down upon the desk in front of her, causing a loud smack to be heard.

"Never underestimate me!" she yelled out in determination, her face set. "I'll never back down, yah know! I'll accept your stupid question! Even if I risk ending up a genin for the rest of my life, I'll still be able to become Hokage, even if I can only make it by pure stubbornness, I don't care! Believe it!"

Her speech seemed to have lifted those who were left spirits. They were all smiling and staring at her in wonder. Those who weren't smiling were just staring at her, but they didn't feel like backing out either. Ibiki stared at them, the blonde's speech seeming to have given people enough courage to continue but he still had to try to get them to back out. There was still too many standing, and he blamed it completely on the pigtailed girl.

"I'll ask you one last time, this is a decision that could affect the rest of your life, quit now, while you still have the chance."

"I never go back on my word, cussedness is part of my shinobi skill set." Naruko smiled at the man, he wasn't going to be able to get into her head, she wouldn't allow that to happen. He glanced around the room noticing that seventy-eight were still there, and thanks to her they wouldn't leave even if he tried, she was interesting. Ibiki nodded standing up straighter as he made eye contact with everyone in the room.

"That's a very good call," he said. "Everyone who is still here, has just passed the first exam!" Naruko who had been holding her breath waiting to hear the impossible question practically deflated as the words slipped from his mouth. The air whooshed out of her lungs as relief filled her body. She had made it! It was all just a test, she wouldn't be stuck as a genin forever.

Glancing behind her she threw an excited smile her teammates way. Getting one in return from Sakura, and a annoyed but soften glare from Sasuke.

They had made it! She would beat whatever was thrown her way. Believe it!

 **Did you guys like the added content? I wanted the scene at the exams to be different from Naruto. She had been studying seals, and I figured that this would be an easy technique since all you need is to know how to draw the symbol and then add chakra to it. A more simple seal.**

 **I had another idea to** **substitute** **a clone with her real self and then run off to see Iruka for the answers but I couldn't figure out how to make it to where they wouldn't notice the clone taking her spot and her disappearing in a room full of people watching her every movement. This was an easier solution even though I could have totally done the clone one.**

 **Also keep looking for the hint of Naruko/Sasuke moments. I hide them in most chapters!**

 **Review! Hope you have enjoyed! Thanks for reading!**


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